I really enjoyed my visit on Friday evening to the Thames Tunnel and
Fancy Fair, for which I had a combined ticket. There are a lot of TfL
staff volunteers working hard, however reception arrangements aren't
great and the first point of contact for most visitors is likely to be
agency security guards who aren't necessarily forthcoming with
information, and some people missed their tours due to being/queuing
in the wrong place, so I hope this post is helpful to those visiting
on Saturday.

The Thames Tunnel tours start from Rotherhithe Station, and queuing
for these is at the station entrance on Brunel Road. Thames Tunnel
tours are at set times, as already chosen by visitors with tickets for
these tours.

The Fancy Fair is at the Brunel Museum in Railway Avenue. When I
attended there were no queues for the Fancy Fair itself, and visitors
could enter and exit freely at any time, even without ticket checks.
Visitors with tickets for Thames Tunnel tours at set times can
therefore visit the Fancy Fair at any time.

The Fancy Fair addtionally includes a visit to the shaft from which
the tunnel was dug, in which I understand visitors can descend stairs
to just above the level of the tunnel (I didn't visit the shaft).
There were queues outside the Brunel Museum to visit the shaft when I
arrived, and although visits to the shaft are not at set times,
visitors were being taken in groups.

The source of confusion for many visitors was the scarcity of TfL
staff in a welcoming role, mix ups over location between Rotherhithe
Station and the Brunel Museum, and mix ups between queues for Thames
Tunnel tours and queues for shaft visits. If in doubt, don't be afraid
to ask a member of staff what's going on.

Thanks to everyone who made this event possible.
Dominic

"the first point of contact for most visitors is likely to be
agency security guards who aren't necessarily forthcoming with
information,

Well, there's a surprise!

The source of confusion for many visitors was the scarcity of TfL
staff in a welcoming role, mix ups over location between Rotherhithe
Station and the Brunel Museum, and mix ups between queues for Thames
Tunnel tours and queues for shaft visits. If in doubt, don't be afraid
to ask a member of staff what's going on.

Thanks to everyone who made this event possible.
Dominic

Thanks Dominic - this is good advice

I have to say it wasnt the best organised event. Many people didnt
realise there were two seperate events and so a lot of people had
bought tickets for the Fancy Fair thinking they could go on the
tunnell tour and were disapointed to be turned away by brusque
security cards. Staff at the museum were then having to take flak from
people turned away from the tunnel tour. I felt annoyed for a while,
but in the end the shaft visit was very interesting and the guy who
gave the talk was very good, so my disapointment subsided.

Rob

On 13/03/2010 00:26, Dominic wrote:
I really enjoyed my visit on Friday evening to the Thames Tunnel and
Fancy Fair, for which I had a combined ticket. There are a lot of TfL
staff volunteers working hard, however reception arrangements aren't
great and the first point of contact for most visitors is likely to be
agency security guards who aren't necessarily forthcoming with
information, and some people missed their tours due to being/queuing
in the wrong place, so I hope this post is helpful to those visiting
on Saturday.

The Thames Tunnel tours start from Rotherhithe Station, and queuing
for these is at the station entrance on Brunel Road. Thames Tunnel
tours are at set times, as already chosen by visitors with tickets for
these tours.

The Fancy Fair is at the Brunel Museum in Railway Avenue. When I
attended there were no queues for the Fancy Fair itself, and visitors
could enter and exit freely at any time, even without ticket checks.
Visitors with tickets for Thames Tunnel tours at set times can
therefore visit the Fancy Fair at any time.

The Fancy Fair addtionally includes a visit to the shaft from which
the tunnel was dug, in which I understand visitors can descend stairs
to just above the level of the tunnel (I didn't visit the shaft).
There were queues outside the Brunel Museum to visit the shaft when I
arrived, and although visits to the shaft are not at set times,
visitors were being taken in groups.

The source of confusion for many visitors was the scarcity of TfL
staff in a welcoming role, mix ups over location between Rotherhithe
Station and the Brunel Museum, and mix ups between queues for Thames
Tunnel tours and queues for shaft visits. If in doubt, don't be afraid
to ask a member of staff what's going on.

Thanks to everyone who made this event possible.
Dominic
Anychance of them doing repeat tours of the tunnel in coming weeks,
thanks to high demand?

Anychance of them doing repeat tours of the tunnel in coming weeks,
thanks to high demand?

While nothing is impossible I doubt it very much.

On Sat, 13 Mar 2010 00:30:56 -0800 (PST), Rob
wrote:

Many people didnt
realise there were two seperate events and so a lot of people had
bought tickets for the Fancy Fair thinking they could go on the
tunnell tour

While this doesn't surprise me weren't the tickets sold as 'tunnel' or
'fancy fair' or 'combined'?

Unfortunately I couldn't get there. Was the 'shaft visit' just the
normal museum experience (which is in the top of the shaft) or
something more?

On 13/03/2010 15:55, Paul Corfield wrote:
On Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:26:38 -0800 (PST),
wrote:


The walk through the tunnel and the chance to see it and the renewed
railway and the stations was great though.

How very lucky you are.

I'm so glad I managed to get
a ticket. I suspect they could have run the event for 4 days and been
full on every session if it had been properly advertised.

Because the amount of people looking to get a ticket would likely have
been much more than they could handle, I imagine.

Thus, they decided to keep it low key, such as by word of mouth.

Indeed - probably a once in a lifetime chance to see a real piece of
railway history.

Really it was, and I find myself most disappointed that I could not
secure a ticket.

On Mar 13, 12:29*pm, "Graham Harrison"
wrote:
Anychance of them doing repeat tours of the tunnel in coming weeks,
thanks to high demand?

While nothing is impossible I doubt it very much.

Indeed - there's a new railway service to run through it after all!

In article
s.com, Mizter T scribeth thus

On Mar 13, 12:29*pm, "Graham Harrison"
wrote:
Anychance of them doing repeat tours of the tunnel in coming weeks,
thanks to high demand?

While nothing is impossible I doubt it very much.

Indeed - there's a new railway service to run through it after all!


Well due to a "not that well healed broken leg" I decided not to go, not
wanting to cause a possible problem mid Tunnel if I tripped base over
apex but its nice to read the comments of those who did go, and whilst
not that well publicised and with some organisational problems hats off
to those who had the idea of making it possible, very imaginative:-)

Fantastic idea to be in the exact same place as the Brunel's and their
workers and all that.

I bet if they were to arrange a trip through the Box Hill tunnel in open
topped wagons with a lot of light and running quite slow it'd attract a
lot of takers!..

Perhaps that also prove the st***Ic re***ve mystery as well.....


--
Tony Sayer

On Mon, 15 Mar 2010 11:01:15 +0000, tony sayer
wrote:

I bet if they were to arrange a trip through the Box Hill tunnel in open
topped wagons with a lot of light and running quite slow it'd attract a
lot of takers!..


Although that tunnel runs under Box Hill, it is more correctly
referred to as "Box Tunnel".