In article . co.uk, Jules
wrote:

On Wed, 21 Feb 2007 12:47:59 -0800, Mizter T wrote:
Dare I suggest that your sensible and boring helicopter plan doesn't
properly take account of peoples desire for intrigue and high drama?

It does when the helicopters are stored underground on high alert, and in
the event of them being needed a whole section of lawn outside Buckingham
Palace slides back to reveal them.

All installed last year by a crew dressed to look like members of Time
Team, of course.


And of course that removable section of lawn is actually the PentaLawn
2000, as demonstrated on 11 Sept. 2001 in Washington DC:
http://thewebfairy.com/killtown/pentalawn.html

--
-Glennl
The despammed service works OK, but unfortunately
now the spammers grab addresses for use as "from" address too!
e-mail hint: add 1 to quantity after gl to get 4317.

In article ,
David Biddulph wrote:
"Graeme Wall" wrote in message
...
In message .com
"Mizter T" wrote:
...
I should of course have addressed that question towards Graeme, not
Christopher, as it was he who posed the notion that there are two
central London runways already.

The Mall and Hyde Park, according to Duncan Campbell in War Plan UK.
Mind you I wouldn't want to be landing in the Mall with a crosswind.

Isn't that why The Mall is laid out East-West, in the direction of the
prevailing winds? :-)

and wasn't it silly to build Windsor Castle in the flight path for Heathrow?

--
From KT24 - in "Leafy Surrey"

Using a RISC OS computer running v5.11

"asdf" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 21 Feb 2007 17:12:03 +0000, Ben wrote:

Down Street is nearer, and also benefits from not having passengers or
maintenance staff poking about.

Wouldn't such a thing be common knowledge among the maintenance people
who walk the line, or are they well trained in not noticing things.

Perhaps you'll find that none of them are ever told to walk Down
Street Siding, which is said to continue to Buckingham Palace.

Having set this enquiry running, I'm now wondering how often members of the
royal family, and/or their staff, travel by Tube.

Or perhaps it is a "just in case" escape facility?

--
Brian
"Fight like the Devil, die like a gentleman."

"Albert" wrote in message
...
"Brian Watson" wrote ...

Blokey who phoned in said he had to sign the OSA to work on the site.

In which case, what was he doing talking about it then?

He was very wary about it and gave no detail.

He just said a building team had broken into the tunnel by mistake and the
company he works for were called in to repair the breach.

Robert Elms then brought the phone call to an end.

--
Brian
"Fight like the Devil, die like a gentleman."

In message
"Nick Pedley" wrote:


"Graeme Wall" wrote in message
...
As to the story of evacuating the Royal Family in an emergency there are
two
runways in Central London capable of taking an aircraft of the Queens
Flight
assuming the latter still exists.

Why waste time driving to one of these spots which would need some
preparation when a helicopter based in your back garden can get you further
away in the same time?

The plans I'm talking about were drawn up on the early 1950s when helicopters
were small and unreliable.

--
Graeme Wall
This address is not read, substitute trains for rail.
Transport Miscellany at http://www.greywall.demon.co.uk/rail/index.html

In message . com
"MIG" wrote:

On Feb 21, 11:38 pm, Graeme Wall wrote:
[snip]

More to the point, the Victoria line was deep enough that subsidence was
not though to be a problem. Also the legal situation had been clarified.
ie you don't own the land under your property, unlike the USA. This
enables the Government to sell off the mineral rights.


The Victoria is not generally deeper than other lines, more the opposite,
although it does go up and down a lot.
[snip]

My point was not that it is deeper than the others but is deep enough not to
cause subsidence. Experience gained from the fact the other tube lines had
no subsidence problems.

--
Graeme Wall
This address is not read, substitute trains for rail.
Transport Miscellany at http://www.greywall.demon.co.uk/rail/index.html

In message
"David Biddulph" wrote:

"Graeme Wall" wrote in message
...
In message .com
"Mizter T" wrote:
...
I should of course have addressed that question towards Graeme, not
Christopher, as it was he who posed the notion that there are two
central London runways already.

The Mall and Hyde Park, according to Duncan Campbell in War Plan UK.
Mind you I wouldn't want to be landing in the Mall with a crosswind.

Isn't that why The Mall is laid out East-West, in the direction of the
prevailing winds? :-)

Precisely, these Georgians thought of everything. Probably advised by that
nice M Montgolfier.

--
Graeme Wall
This address is not read, substitute trains for rail.
Transport Miscellany at http://www.greywall.demon.co.uk/rail/index.html

"Graeme Wall" wrote

More to the point, the Victoria line was deep enough that subsidence was
not
though to be a problem. Also the legal situation had been clarified. ie
you
don't own the land under your property, unlike the USA. This enables the
Government to sell off the mineral rights.

AIUI you do own the land under your property. But parliament has
nationalised mineral rights, so you don't own those, and is willing to grant
compulsory purchase powers for a wayleave for a new underground railway. If
it goes under your property you'll be paid for the wayleave, but it won't be
very much as it will be assumed you don't have any other use for the land.

Peter

In message
"Brian Watson" wrote:


"asdf" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 21 Feb 2007 17:12:03 +0000, Ben wrote:

Down Street is nearer, and also benefits from not having passengers or
maintenance staff poking about.

Wouldn't such a thing be common knowledge among the maintenance people
who walk the line, or are they well trained in not noticing things.

Perhaps you'll find that none of them are ever told to walk Down Street
Siding, which is said to continue to Buckingham Palace.

Having set this enquiry running, I'm now wondering how often members of the
royal family, and/or their staff, travel by Tube.

Define staff, I'm sure the office workers[1], gardeners, cleaners and so on
at Buckingham Palace all come into work by tube. The Royal family don't
travel by public transport because of the security problems it would pose.


Or perhaps it is a "just in case" escape facility?


What is? The general concensus is that there is no such facility.

[1] Some members of staff do live on the premises, the top floor at the front
is a series of staff rooms and apartmemts.

--
Graeme Wall
This address is not read, substitute trains for rail.
Transport Miscellany at http://www.greywall.demon.co.uk/rail/index.html

On 22 Feb, 03:19, "Westbourne" wrote:
On 22 Feb, 02:00, "Mizter T" wrote:



Brian Watson wrote:
A contributor to The Robert Elms Show on BBC Radio London has just claimed
there are secret underground train lines between Buckingham Palace and
various other London sites.

Nifty conspiracy theory, or fact?

--
Brian

I heard a bit of this whilst out for a jog this afternoon - if anyone
wants to listen again for the next week they can do so by following
this link:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/aod/netwo...l?london/rober...

I've heard plenty of good stuff about London on Robert Elms' show when
I've tuned in, but the stories about secret Underground railways that
featured on this particular show was not good stuff, it was all a load
of cobblers!

There are undoubtedly some quasi-secret tunnels and installations in
London - for example the "Q-Whitehall" facility and "PINDAR" [1] - and
there are quite possibly a number of others - but there's no secret
Underground railway lines!

More about the aforementioned underground installations on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_citadels_under_London

If you want to read about a Metro system that quite possibly does have
a secret line, as well as a supposed dual-purpose so it serves as a
link between military facilities, take a look at this unofficial site
about the Pyongyang Metro:
http://www.pyongyang-metro.com/index.html

That pyongyang link is interesting, thanks.

As for all the conspiracy nutters, this was all being bandied about on
the other forum. I still believe in the box tunnel though. Most
interesting thread.


The Box Tunnel at Corsham is definitely for real - the academic and
author Peter Hennessy made an authorised site visit to Corsham with a
few of his students and this is recalled, with photos, in his book
"The Secret State". Intriguingly they were only allowed in some (now
disused) areas of the Corsham complex, so the possibility remains that
other parts are still in government/military use. Hennessy was also
allowed down into PINDAR, the communications/command centre under the
MoD.

Part of the problem with all such talk of secret underground
installations is that many different facts, stories and rumours get
conflated together, and the end result can be something of a fantasy.

The people at the Subterranea Britannica society have a splendid
website which is well researched and draws on fact rather than
fiction:
http://www.subbrit.org.uk/