The Chunnel : the amazing story of the undersea crossing of the English Channel

The first underwater tunnel was 900 meters long and was dug under the Euphrates at Babylon in 2180 BCE. The second underwater passage was 365 meters and was finished in 1843, more than 4000 years later under the Thames. Chunnel by Drew Featherston describes the history of underwater tunnels noting

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that there have been numerous tunnels excavated to deliver water, but few built to traverse under the water. The tunnel recently completed under the English Channel was dug simultaneously from both the British and French sides. As they neared each other, tension mounted for it was crucial their meeting point be almost exact. They could not afford to be as much as a meter out of alignment. They had to take hundreds of sightings to measure the angles and sides of the many-sided polygon that provide the reference points. to describe a straight line. In a tunnel that's not possible so special techniques had to be developed. A beam of light could not be used because the light is refracted by the differences in air temperature and the tunnel was not straight; it turned and curved up and down to follow the good layer of rock. One reason the tunnel was not built for cars was the hypnotic effect light in a tunnel can have on some drivers. In long Alpine tunnels police motorcyclists remain ready to help those who have stopped in panic from the sensation that the walls are moving in on them. " they have to peel a driver's rigid fingers off the wheel."

British engineering was the antithesis of the French cult of the "" The British engineer was an acknowledged master of finding practical solutions to most any problem — except how to hoist himself to the social plane that his skills merited. " English upper crust was roundly technophobic, driven by a profound nostalgia for a bucolic Britain that had disappeared from the earth." The two countries had vastly differing organizational structures, too. Besides the cultural differences, the banks, personalities, and governments, all dictated various styles at one point or another. (And remember, the Chunnel was privately financed.) Research conducted by one of the companies on hundreds of major projects revealed a set of seventeen metaregles or general principles. They discovered that the delegation of broad powers to the project director was essential. The director could summon corporate resources but had to have substantial independence. They were to be ' freed from the mechanistic procedures of Frederick Taylor whose theories the report concluded led to rampant bureaucratization. The overall philosophy that should be adopted was " matter how large the project, it must never crush individuals."

Unfortunately, that' what the Chunnel project began to do. One reason was the interlocking structure of all the competing organizations. The contracts reveals the basic flaws. Much like a marriage that has a contract which is itself a predictor of failure, not a way to organize love. Soon the lawyers became too important. As one executive put it, " the overall policy is to manage by lawyers rather than managers. . . . They have opinions; it's their job. But they are not to decide what is to be done. . . . The project has created a great deal of tension between the individuals, because it's not geared to solving problems. It's geared to placing blame."

Procedures were created by managers for every conceivable possibility. Despite evidence that many of the tunnel workers could not read, the procedures continued to be created. " It came to a point, I think, where everyone became punch-drunk with it, certainly in regards to things like writing procedures. There were procedures for everything. There were people being employed just to write procedures. The quality of the procedure — whether it was necessary, whether the guys understood it — didn't matter as long as they signed for it."

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