Absolute brilliant vid of Scotland st tunnel I left Edinburgh 40 years ago but was often in that tunnel in the 70s used to go through it to waverly on motorbikes and look through the railings in waverly, think I walked it once, it was erie I know there was a incline but didn't notice it at the time , I was astounded to learn the southern end was blocked with shops I would have thought it could have been a tourist trail of some sort I think it was a air raid shelter and communication center during ww2

@FeoragForsyth

2 жыл бұрын

Despite the shops, there's still enough room. It would be cool to add it to the cycle network, with a bike park at the station end.

@ThomasTrue

2 жыл бұрын

Scotland Street Tunnel housed the LNER Scottish Divisional wartime HQ during WWII, although this was only in an emergency, and the LNER had taken over the old NBR HQ on Waterloo Place. It was never an official air raid shelter, but G.F. Fiennes, a clerk in Waverley at the time, relates in his autobiography, "I Tried to Run a Railway", that when air raid sirens went off in Edinburgh one day, women and children being evacuated were quickly herded into Scotland Street Tunnel for safety.

Issues with the Tay bridge. Wonderful understatement

Absolutely brilliant piece of work. Great stuff👍👍👍

Fantastic video, thanks for putting this together, love learning about the history of Edinburgh! 😊

Love this, another thing I did not know. Look at W&AK Johnston they have a great history in Edinburgh

As a Edinburgh postie I used to deliver mail to Scotland street along Royal Crescent,also as we for a time stayed in Cumberland Street when I was young we used to play in the park that was at the foot of Scotland Street,often saw the boarded up tunnel and wondered at the time where it led, found this out in later years. 🤔

@FeoragForsyth

Жыл бұрын

Cool. I remember it being easier to get into when I first moved here, but I never got round to it.

I remember when the tunnel was open you would walk up to Waverley. But the piles of Waverley market pierced the railway tunnel

@FeoragForsyth

25 күн бұрын

The gate was left unlocked a few years back and a couple of friends went in and took lots of photos. Alas, the one with the camera is no longer with us, but I enjoyed his accounts of the adventure. I was out of town at the time, otherwise I'd have been there too.

Excellent video, thank you.

I shared a basement flat in Scotland Street with about ten others when I was a student. It was the only way we could afford it. Bodies everywhere. Never heard about the tunnel until years later, but this video has added much more information. Great video and the maps are excellent. Many thanks.

I remember in the 1970s a gang of bank robbers executed their getaway through the tunnel, exiting at Scotland Street, where they had a car ready. This was well before the Princes Mall (Waverley Shopping Centre) existed. On that site was a Victorian fruit and vegetable market and even at the time of the robbery it was possible to go right along the tunnel’s length. During the Second World War the tunnel was earmarked as an air raid shelter, though I don’t know whether it was much used. Later part of it was used as a short-lived mushroom farm. I only know this because I worked at what is now The Balmoral Hotel and there are tunnels from that, or were, going hither and thither. Interesting upload though, thank you.

@FeoragForsyth

Жыл бұрын

Cool story. I'm interested to hear more about the hotel tunnels because a late friend mentioned their existence (but also a lift, which couldn't have gone where he claimed unless it was a Great Glass Elevator). He did manage to get into the Scotland Street Tunnel though, and took photos of wartime stuff - not a shelter, but some kind of control centre apparently. Alas, by the time I was working on this video, the brain tumour was busy taking away his memories including his memory of having taken all the photos he'd showed me 😞

@markshrimpton3138

Жыл бұрын

@@FeoragForsyth I worked there part time in the late 70s then again in the mid 80s. The hotel extends almost as far below Princes Street as it rises above it. Myriad rooms, corridors, tunnels. It was a rabbit warren. Whether it’s still like that I don’t know. It was built as a railway hotel and was still under BR’s ownership during the times I worked there. Many of the underground rooms I saw were filled with discarded hotel furniture and fixtures. There were two huge whisky blending vats, big boilers that fed steam out into the steam locomotives. Then there were doors that led through into tunnels and supporting arches beyond the hotel boundaries. Heaven knows why. The architect was W. Hamilton Beattie who died before the hotel was completed. He also designed the Royal British Hotel and the Jenners building.

@markshrimpton3138

Жыл бұрын

@@FeoragForsyth on reading your reply again and engaging my brain I realise that the lift to which your friend referred was most likely the one in the Waverley station that took train passengers up to the hotel (and vice versa). When you exited the booking hall and turned right there were doors immediately to your right which took you into a small lobby. Inside was a lift which went up just one level. You came out, turned right and trundled over the railway lines, down a series of corridors then took another lift which came up in the hotel foyer. It’s long gone. I suppose not many hotel guests arrive by train and those that do are expected to give themselves a heart attack going up the Waverley steps. Someone told me there’s now an escalator. I don’t live in Edinburgh now, it’s too much of a all year round tourist town, with no real shops.

@FeoragForsyth

Жыл бұрын

@@markshrimpton3138 - that'll be the one. There are now escalators, and plenty of lifts, though the escalators have a habit of not working.

Thank you for sharing this with us!

Very informative, well researched and entertaining. Thanks

Great video and very interesting stuff!

Willie Tescos used do an amazing breakfast until they banned smoking and the customer base vanished. First step on a day of hangover meeting many friends from the night before from Broughton st

Very interesting, and nice use of the maps.

@FeoragForsyth

3 жыл бұрын

Street Rambler - thanks. The maps site is an absolute treasure, isn’t it?

@streetrambler134

3 жыл бұрын

@@FeoragForsyth do you need to ask before using them as would love to use the maps from them more too

@FeoragForsyth

3 жыл бұрын

Street Rambler - No. There’s a page on the site giving the conditions for using them, which basically boils down to “put this text on your thing”. There are some complications, but not many.

@streetrambler134

3 жыл бұрын

@@FeoragForsyth Cheers, will check it out later as editing my mural explore of Glastonbury.

@FeoragForsyth

3 жыл бұрын

Street Rambler - Looking forward to seeing what you do.

Robert Peel (1788-1850) was the Founder of the first new Metropolitan Police Force at Scotland Yard in 1829.

7:25 so beautiful~~~^^ I watched your full vedio^^

R.I.P Prince Albert.

Subsistence on Scotland st

@FeoragForsyth

25 күн бұрын

You just know that's how it would be described on Fix My Street. And the council would get the bleme.

Ah, health and safety weren't for the common people, then just give them a pick and a penny a day and send them to their box!