In article , Paul Corfield
wrote:
On Wed, 07 Jan 2004 14:26:15 GMT, "Richard J."
wrote:

Some residents who live above the proposed line of the Crossrail
tunnels are concerned about possible noise and vibration in their
homes when the trains are running. Is there anyone on utl who lives
or works directly above an existing tube (not sub-surface) tunnel?
If so, do you experience any noise and vibration?

I don't live above a tube tunnel. However the Crossrail tunnels are
likely to be far deeper than tube tunnels. They will also be
constructed to far higher standards than any tube line in London
barring the recent DLR and JLE tunnels. While I don't think anyone
can provide a guarantee that there will be no noise I would say the
risk from modern infrastructure design and modern rolling stock will
be low. Obvious areas of potential environmental harm will have to be
identified and mitigated / removed in order for the project to
proceed.

Similarly, have you had any cracks and subsidence? There was a
report in March 2002 that the land above the line of the JLE had
sunk by the odd centimetre.

Not aware of any JLE subsidence but there are provisions in the
legislation that allowed construction to put right any damage that is
demonstrably caused by the line. Such provisions are standard
practice and usually put in place to deal with issues raised by
objectors to the scheme.

Before the JLE was built there was a major programme of condition
surveys to record all cracks etc in buildings along the route. This
included much of Whitehall, the Palace of Westminster and Boudica's
statue. This was to ensure that no one was able to claim for
pre-existing problems. (Including presumably the Government).

There was a lot of press nonsense about the effect of the construction
of Westminster station on the Victoria Tower, including from one paper
that did not seem to know the difference between metres and
milli-metres. The effect was less than that during the construction of
the underground car park in the 1970's. The tower moves just as much
between tides in the River Thames!

John