The Brunel Museum's Original Thames Tunnel Drawings, What They Reveal

[BTS AGM 2019 and BTS May]
Speaker(s)
Bryn Bird (M retired) Brunel Museum
This meeting will look at the collection of original Thames Tunnel drawings. Described as the most significant Brunel drawings ever to enter the public domain and acquired by the Brunel Museum, Rotherhithe, they cover the period when Marc Isambard Brunel was developing and executing (with the help of his son Isambard Kingdom Brunel) the construction of his Thames Tunnel, the first in the world under a navigable waterway. They reveal how his ideas started and evolved, pulling in and then discarding other contemporary inventions; how he won the conviction of his shareholders, then won them over, time and time again; how his audacious self-confidence and patience was challenged from all directions yet was finally rewarded. His achievement gave others the confidence to tunnel in soft grounds everywhere and laid the foundations for urban Metro systems throughout the world. Pictorially and conceptually, it seems just a few short steps from the Brunel tunnelling shield to a modern tunnel boring machine.
Disclaimer : All opinions and views expressed by the speakers, including those participating in the Q&A, are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of the British Tunnelling Society or the Institution of Civil Engineers.