Tuesday, August 15, 2006

The Holland Tunnel



This week brings me to New York City with one CVS store in Brooklyn and the other in Queens. I took the Holland Tunnel back to Newark NJ and my hotel.


The tunnel opens in 1927 after seven years of construction, during which only thirteen "sandhogs" (as the construction workers were called) die. The greatest danger facing the workers is the bends. Construction is carried out under air pressure, which has to balance river pressure. Workers have to pass through decompression chambers, much as divers do coming up from deep water. None of the worker fatalities are from the bends, however. The toll in 1927 is fifty cents, and the trip takes only eight minutes. The tunnel when it opens is the longest underwater tunnel in the world, with its north tube 8,558 feet long and its south tube 8,371 feet long. On its first day of operation, 51,694 vehicles pass through. The total cost of the tunnel is $48 million. Today, it would cost approximately $1.4 billion.

For more visit: http://www.panynj.gov/CommutingTravel/tunnels/html/holland.html

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