@@johnm2012 They were bought by Mercury telephones, who drained the high-pressure water pipes and used them to feed cables into buildings without having to dig up the roadways. Such a waste of a 'green' power source.
So why did you miss the rail extension to the mail rail that extends upto copper mines in Wales This is in current plans to evacuate valuables and art out of London in a hurry.
@@cardiffian558th-cam.com/video/aY11tctPOnw/w-d-xo.htmlfeature=shared Vodafone now owns Mercury's network as they acquired C&W in 2012, Vodafone has a secret tunnel as well
It feels like it should be possible to get some sort of use out of it, tunnels are a valuable investment, especially when they link together multiple train stations.
Its used for tourism right now! The tunnels are really too small to transport people regularly, and there aren’t too many other use cases for the tunnels.
Most likely the sections that aren't being used as a tourist attraction, will end up with cabling. The first tunnel under the Thames, the Tower Subway, which was designed as an under-the-Thames foot tunnel, is now used as a super cable duct.
Chicago has a similar freight unnel network under the city streets. It is connected to the basement of many of the buildings downtown and a rail network provided delivery service for packages as well as coal for heating to the buildings. The network was shutdown in 1959 and largely forgotten. In 1992, one of the tunnels under the Chicago river was punctured. This flooded the system as well as two dozen buildings that still had open tunnel connections. The tunnels are now used primarily for utility and communication lines.
I used to take Opinion Formers on Mail Rail in the 1990’s when I was a Public Affairs Executive at The Post Office Corporation. We had a few carriages with plexiglass domes and seats for the MPs, Peers etc to sit in whilst we ran them around the network. It was an incredible successful operation and transported vast amounts of mail daily. There was a proposal to extend the route to Willesden, the home of the Princess Royal Distribution Centre. The PRDC was the southern hub of the Travelling Post Office and the Networker system. We actually opened several dedicated Sorting Offices on the National Rail Network. My last opening event took place in Bristol. When Mail volumes dropped and the reliability of EWS to deliver Mail by train became a massive problem, we looked at moving Mail to roads. A study was undertaken to open Mail Rail to Oxford Street shops, and by doing so it would reduce the amount of vehicular traffic. But, the study showed that the idea wasn’t feasible and Mail Rail closed. The Travelling Post Office network also went the same way. The PRDC is now, from what I understand, mostly used as a vehicle hub?
PRDC was built on railway land with the hope that most of the mail would be transported by train. Several passenger trains were converted to carry containers for exclusive use by Royal Mail, even being painted Post office red in colour. A reversing spur was built for the trains at Kensal Rise on the high-level North London line at a considerable cost. However, train use reduced dramatically within a few years of its opening: now 50-foot long articulated lorries arrive every two minutes at the centre from all parts of the country. The 'mail rail' from Paddington was going to follow the route of the Bakerloo line which runs alongside the PRDC at Stonebridge Park. There are still a dozen derelict mail train carriages on a spur outside the centre after twenty years not moving!
Further to my previous message, Royal Mail has just announced that they will be ceasing using trains from next October. They have also ended the contract with DB Rail as from that date. The diesel lorries will be converted to electric vehicles over the next three years (yeah, of course!). {See the current "Rail" magazine for full details of this change.} This brings into question the compliance with planning permission for the £5 million depot.
@@cardiffian558 oh that’s interesting! One of my other jobs was to organise the “official opening” of the new hubs being built to accommodate the new networker style trains. Mostly they were just a big shed alongside the track where the train could be off-loaded of its York Roll containers. My last event was at Bristol Parkway. We chartered a train and engine which took guests to the new depot. They were met on arrival by a jazz band and catering. Then the local mayor (I think) officially opened the “station”.
@@cardiffian558 my old boss was Alan Williams, I think he still writes for various Rail magazines? I believe he may even have a ride-on garden railway on his property?
Back when there were two deliveries a day - my grandmother said that she could send a letter in the morning, to her sister two miles away, and recieve a reply in the afternoon mail. This was before the they had telephones. :)
Regarding vacuum tube mail delivery, Paris adopted such a system which ran from 1868 all the way to 1984 allowing the delivery of urgent messages within minutes. The network covered 427km at it's maximum, and carried up to 30 million message per year. Today the network is no longer in use but some of the pumping stations responsible for the running of the system still exist.
Letter posted in Bristol would be sorted in Bristol, and if going to Manchester would be put on a train going to Manchester (not necessarily a Travelling Post Office train). On arrival in Manchester, it would then be sorted for the specific delivery round.
@@johnm2012 used to be the case, these days maybe not, I live in Hereford all our mails sorted in Birmingham, so we collect local mail load it on a lorry send it to Birmingham who sorts it puts it on another lorry and sends it back!
I remember being part of a group looking into the possibility of using the Mail Rail trains to deliver stock to the large retail outlets in Oxford Street, e.g. Selfridges. The trains passed just below the basements of these premises, so it was technically feasible.
I feel like that should be done still, or maybe the whole system could reconverted for parcel delivery? While barely any letters are sent anymore, parcel delivery and logistics sectors are bigger than ever! I feel like a huge amount of vehicles could be taken off the road and replaced with systems like this, with people on bikes and small autonomous vehicles being used to deliver said items from the nearest station to their final destination. I feel like it could still have a future and help efficiency and reduce pollution and congestion.
Mail Rail can be seen in action, in the Bruce Willis movie "Hudson hawk", where it is portrayed as "The Vatican's mail system". The extra's in the scene, are (or were) Mail Rail employees. Watch the film and you will see it in action.
Good to hear about this. Very interesting. One item - @3:50 … your reference to “an electronic railway..” it really would have been an “electric railway” - control systems would have been quite basic back then - consisting of mechanical switches, usually with human operators. Electronic ( even primitive electronics) controls didn’t really come into use until much later in the 20th century. So, even today - “electric” trains may be controlled electronically - but the train itself is electric.
I hosted a meeting with B.R. engineers at Mount Pleasant. After the meeting I arranged a visit to Mail Rail and we were shown all around the maintenance area. B.R. Engineers were very impressed with how clean the area was.
Backin the 1920’s mail delivery was next day or even same day! Grandad in business said there were several post deliveries to his work every working day!
When I sorted mail (NZPO) in 1977-78 the saying was "Sorted today, delivered tomorrow". We now have mail deliveries three times per week. In my area it's Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.
When I was a kid (50s/60s), mail arrived the next day, wherever you sent it (and all at one price!). If something didn't arrive before breakfast, it might come second delivery (around mid-morning), and if it still hadn't turned up, it would usually make it in the afternoon post. In some places there was an evening post as well (just like there were evening newspapers!). Then the two-tier system was introduced - first and second class - mail would still get there the next day, usually, but only first class was guaranteed to get there on time. Then Sunday deliveries went and collections times were reduced (our nearest mail box, now has only one collection a day - at 7am! - and only on weekdays. We now get one delivery a day, usually about 10am, and only on weekdays. And even first class letters don't always get there the next (you have to pay extra for guaranteed next day delivery). Although, admittedly, I hardly ever send anything my post these days (even renewing passports - the example used in the video - can now be done online), and most of the post we get is junk mail, which goes straight in the recycling. I think we get more online deliveries via the Royal Mail than we do actual letters. The final nail in the coffin (from my personal perspective, at least) was the introduction of different charges for different size and weights of letters. We now have a situation where we have very little idea of how much a letter or package is going to cost (and, even if we do, it's unlikely we have the right stamps to hand), so for almost anything I want to post, I now have to walk half a mile to the nearest post office, and queue up for at least 20 minutes. If you don't have a local post office, as many don't these days, you're buggered.
MailRail ended when the decision was taken to build a massive sorting centre in the outskirts of London. The location chosen has good links to the motorway network and is next to one of the main railway lines out of London. The gigantic sorting centre is located in Stonebridge Park NW10. There was no need to shift mail between the various London sorting depots and a railway station, as it could all be done in one gigantic centre, with modern automatic sorting machinary. The centre at Stonebridge Park is called The Princess Royal Distribution Centre.
Interesting, I used to ask about the history of that building when I visited on numerous occasions whilst delivering mail there. There were never any machines in the main expanse anymore… It just turned into some sort of cross dock facility for mail arriving from different places to be reshuffled about in the yorks and then back out on lorrie‘s again
One of my first jobs many moons ago involved me going to Mount Pleasant often and I was always fascinated by the massive Post Office HQ there. I worked under a bloke who was fascinated by such things and would regularly share war stories and the like. Thanks for the vid. It's answered questions I never asked.
I remember reading about the Post Office railway in the London Transport Magazine back sometime in the early fifties. My Father was a London Transport employee (worked at the Acton works), so he got the magazine regularly. The PO railway was featured as something which would be of interest to the the staff of London Transport, especially the railwaymen.
Great video, and you should definitely do one on the Thames Tideway Tunnel, if you haven't done already, since that's going to have a massive effect on our lives with the majority of people not even knowing it exists!
So, moving the main sorting office and Blair/Brown nationalisation spelled the end. Great video. The sewers (the new one too) and the river Fleet are other underground London marvels.
Actually, mail would be delivered the very next day, not in a couple of days. And mail posted within a town or city would often be delivered the same day!
Rail mail had an open day some time in the 80's and my Dad took me to see it. I don't really remember much about it but do remember being taken on a ride through the tunnels in a train adapted for carrying people.
Fascinating to see what this Mail railway was built for delivering mail underneath Central London. Long before Crossrail came which is now the Elizabeth Line.
Great video! I know you mentioned the (then) new Royal Mail terminus that was built out in West London at Princess Royal… The irony of that now is that Royal Mail have also decided to stop all trains running out of there delivering mail across the country and reverting to an all lorry service only! It’s crazy given the pressures on trying to be environmentally friendly and a big privately run company like that is clearly putting profits over doing what’s right. If memory serves there were eight platforms I think at PRDC, which gradually got reduced down to only two or three I think when I was there last a few months ago. Rumour is that PRDC is on leased ground and the government wants it to turn it into some sort of maintenance terminal for the HS2 railway line
It was created back then UK was still the most innovative country in the whole world, those brilliant lads back then truly wanted to create a better world, unlike today.
It actually only took 1 day from Bristol to Manchester until about 2000 and reliability was near to 100%. The railway was only abandoned when next dat delivery was abandoned.
The other thing to note is that hardly any mail is sent by rail anymore.i believe the terminal in West London is Willesden. This survived very short time e. For its intended use. I believe it’s still used but nothing like the volumes it was built for. I took a trip on it last Christmas, I’d recommend anyone to do the same.
I had the opportunity to see the mail railway when I was apprenticed to Sperry Gyroscope as they maintained the embedded microcontroller that ran the railway. The also manufactured and maintained the STD drum equipment used by the GPO( now BT)
It can still be used if they thought of using it for the major post carriers like Amazon, UPS, and the Royal Mail by expanding it to a hib that handles the large amounts of mail to be sorted out for delivery
My Grandfather worked on the mail rail from its early days through to the mid 60s. I know about about it from what my grandmother told me after he died and I was a bit older.
Stop bullshitting. I worked for royal mail and it was shut as the 8 London mail centres were shut down to 2. It was due to falling letter numbers. That's why they have just stopped sending mail by air this year. Also the reason they got rid off the travelling post office ( TPO) on the railway. That's why the service is terrible now. Letters being left in the slots for days at a time because the posties walks are far too big. It's all about money now and not service. When I worked as a postie not one letter could be left undelivered, or you would be done for wilfully delay and sacked. All this mail not being delivered for days at a ti.E are with the managers blessing. It's all about parcels now. And then the CEO of RM got caught bullshiting parliament. He was a little sniffling knob anyway.
I work with Odoo for a legal courier (ironically for this video) and Odoo really does not have such and intuitive web-building programme. You must have been sent a secret programme to 'test'. It's irritably clunky and clow and you can't choose much of the styles for yourself. Apart from plugging a very baffling business programme - this video is great!
My great grandma would send freshly picked fruit and veg from Speyside (in Scotland) where she lived to relatives in London. They were picked in the morning and delivered the same day. This would have been ~20's or 30's. All via Royal Mail.
14:30 Here's one for you: Even fewer people know of its existence, but if you want an abandoned tunnel urbex/planning archive challenge, how about digging up any information you can on the abandoned freight tunnel from Harrods Depository on the southern bank of the river Thames near Barnes to the eponymous tourist trap, sorry, high class store in Knightsbridge‽
Interesting to see how this Underground Mail railway was used underneath Central London before Crossrail (now Elizabeth Line was built). Very interesting.
12:10 "royal mail has been told they can no longer use the main London terminals for their overground trains" Feels like some missing info here... Why? And what station in west London?? I can't find (from an admittedly quick search) any reference to this on wiki or the mail rail website either.
The station he referred to is at Willesden Junction, also known as Princess Royal distribution Centre. Had multiple platforms for the trains to arrive and depart from but over the years most of the platforms were closed off with only two or three surviving and even those have been withdraw now as Royal mail has decided to move all train mail onto The motorway network
I wonder if any companies have ever approached royal mail about using the mail rail to streamline transport between distribution centres. A tunnel under london is definitely valuable infrastructure anyway
I love infrastructure like this. I hope they find new use for this. I'm surprised some big company hasn't found a way to utilize it in tandem with their business or maybe the government finding some kind of way to use it.. Idk. It just seems valuable and useful
Another system also existed in london called the London Necropolis Railway that was used to carry bodies out of london to the cemeteries surrounding. Worth looking into.
I read that the necropolis railway took funeral parties out to Surrey and back again, so it was a passenger railway, as well as a means of moving the deceased.
It would be nice to explain how the trains work. If anyone would like to see a train away from the tunnels, the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre at Quainton has one in its museum.
As an urban explorer I found it interesting to explore and even better because I’ve been to all the stations and Saw rare locomotives that you don’t see in the museum I believe that are not accessible anymore it’s sad to see it rot away and flood and only one part of mail rail is still accessible on the loop mount Pleasant fun fact of mail rail they was going to turn it in to a bicycle tunnel for people but the plan never went through also cross rail to go through but never happen either which is nice so it’s still all one tunnel still most of mail rail is capped or locked with few entry points one station which had me amazed was king Edward building bank that had concrete pumped into it when i looked to me it was a mixture of small and bigger stations like Paddington rathbone place and Liverpool Street station and Whitechapel seemed bigger than the rest of the stations all round loved it and best railway in London
It served most district offices north of the thames now those offices are just delivery offices.All collections are now dealt with in mail centers outside London.Tharefore the Post Office Railway is not required.
it's not abandoned. i've been on it. it's now a tourist attraction where you can travel between two station in specially designed trains. just look it up.
I needed to know why they couldn’t dig a tunnel and do an extension for most of the mainline Trains so that they could extend the unused abandoned underground train stations. Why couldn’t they use the part D78 Stock train doors on the sides and also restructure the front face of the A60 and A62 stock which will include the class 507, class 508, class 313, class 314 and class 315 remix and make them all together and also redesign all of them into an overhead wire line trains and also make most of them into Five carriages per units and also having three Disabled Toilets on those Five cars per units A60 and A62 stock trains and also convert the A60 and A62 stock trains into a Gardner 6LXC, Cummins M11, Volvo B10M, Gardner 6LXB, Gardner LG1200 and Gardner 8LXB Diesel Engines and also put the Loud 8-Speed Voith Gearboxes even Loud 10-Speed Leyland Hydra cyclic Gearboxes in the A60 and A62 stock, class 507, class 508, class 313, class 314, and class 315 and also modernise the A60 and A62 stock and make it into 11 carriages per unit so it could have fewer doors, more tables, computers and mobile phone chargers? A Stock Train and 8 Disabled Toilets on those A stock trains. why couldn’t we refurbish and modernise the waterloo and city line Triple-Track train tunnel and make it even much more Larger and extend it to the bank station, making it into a Triple-Track Railway Line so those Five countries such as Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden to convert the waterloo and city line Triple-Track Railway tunnel into a High-Speed Railway lines? The Third Euro tunnel Triple-Track Railway line to make it 11 times better for passengers so they could go from A to B. Then put the modernised 11 carriages per unit A Stock and put them on a bigger modernised Waterloo and city line Triple-Track train tunnel so it could go to bank station to those Five countries such as Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden. The modernised refurbished 11 carriages per unit A stock could be a High Speed The Third Triple-Track Euro Tunnel Train So it is promising and 47 times a lot more possible to do this kind of project if that will be OK for London Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden. oh by the way, could they also tunnel the Triple-Track Railway Line so it will stop from Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex so that the Passengers will go to Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland and Sweden and also extend the Triple-Track Railway Line from the Bank to Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex Stations so that more people from there could go to Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden more Easily. Why couldn't they extend the Piccadilly Line and also build brand-new underground train stations so it could go even further right up to Clapton, Wood Street can they also make another brand new underground train station in Chingford and could they extend the Piccadilly Line and the DLR right up to Chingford? All of the classes 150, 155, 154, 117, 114, 105, and 106, will be replaced by all of the Gardner 6LXC, Cummins M11, Volvo B10M, Gardner 6LXB, Gardner LG1200 and Gardner 8LXB Diesel Five carriages three disabled toilets are air conditioning trains including Highams Park for extended roots which is the Piccadilly line and the DLR trains. Could you also convert all of the 1973 stock trains into an air-conditioned maximum speed 78 km/hours (48 MPH) re-refurbished and make it into a 8 cars per unit if that will be alright, and also extend all of the Piccadilly train stations to make more space for all of the extended 8 car per unit 1973 stock air condition trains and can you also build another Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive Companies and can they order Every 87 Octagon and Every 48 Hexagon shape LNER diagram unique small no.13 and unique small no.11 Boilers from those Countries such as Greece, Italy, Poland, and Sweden, can they make Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive speeds by up to 147MPH so you can try and test it on the Original Mainline so it will be much more safer for the Passengers to enjoy the 147MPH speed Limit only for HS2 and Channel Tunnel mainline services, if they needed 16 Carriages Per units, can they use those class 55’s, class 44’s, class 40’s and class 43HST Diesel Locomotive’s right at the Back of those 18 Carriages Per Units so they can take over at the Back to let those Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive’s have a rest for those interesting Journeys Please!!!!, oh can you make all of those 18 Tonne Boxes of Coal for all of those 147MPH Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive’s so the Companies will Understand us PASSENGER’S!!!! So please make sure that the Builders can do as they are told!!!!!!!!!!!! And PLEASE do something about these very very important Professional ideas Please? Prime Minister of England, Prime Minister of Australia, Prime Minister of Sweden, Prime Minister of Germany, Prime Minister of Italy, Prime Minister of Poland and that Includes the Mayor of London.
For goodness sake! Put some punctuation in. Break up the text with some paragraphs! Then more people might bother to read your (actually quite interesting and certainly detailed) stream of consciousness. Which, I presume, is what all we commenters ultimately want.
In a year or two Royal Mail will cease to exist! I work for a company that shifts most of the UK's mail now. The Post Office put up prices so much they have put THEMSELVES out of business by cheaper FASTER competition. Shame the tunnels cant be used aspassenger lines made bigger ti the size of normal tube likes? GREAT VIDEO.
As always, one why leads to another. Why did the government require the postal service to stop using London's mainline stations? I will now have to research into that.
That rail network has really economic value today thanks to thanks to the huge jump in package shipping thanks to Amazon. Slip so FC or Distros on top of the old station
It's not really a network as there's only one line, extending from Paddington to Whitechapel with some fancy (but not networky) trackwork at Mount Pleasant.
I cannot help but think that it must be cheaper to expand the diameter of these existing tunnels than build completely new ones outright - perhaps they could be redone to double as a new underground line. Large profile like the Elizabeth line would probably not be feasible, but small profile such as the piccadilly line should be doable. Wonder why TFL didn't at least study that proposal.
However in the deeper analysis the route is broadly served now by the Elizabeth Line itself and expanding tunnels is more complicated than running a TBM through virgin ground.
It's not a city thing but the US state of Florida was millions of miles of natural underground tunnels full of fresh water that zing and zang all over the place . Many are so big people can sub throw them.
If you know of anything else that is hidden below the streets of London, let us know and we will look into exploring it too
The algorithm recommended your channel to me so I'm not familiar with it yet. Have you looked at the history of the London Hydraulic Power Company?
@@johnm2012 They were bought by Mercury telephones, who drained the high-pressure water pipes and used them to feed cables into buildings without having to dig up the roadways. Such a waste of a 'green' power source.
There's tons under London. I's all been done tho. Hook up with Subterranea Britannica & 28dayslater for starters.
So why did you miss the rail extension to the mail rail that extends upto copper mines in Wales
This is in current plans to evacuate valuables and art out of London in a hurry.
@@cardiffian558th-cam.com/video/aY11tctPOnw/w-d-xo.htmlfeature=shared Vodafone now owns Mercury's network as they acquired C&W in 2012, Vodafone has a secret tunnel as well
It feels like it should be possible to get some sort of use out of it, tunnels are a valuable investment, especially when they link together multiple train stations.
Its used for tourism right now! The tunnels are really too small to transport people regularly, and there aren’t too many other use cases for the tunnels.
@@enews01 Rishi's personal transport?😊 He'd fit!
@@Roy-gi5ulBoris wouldn't !
pneumatic tube transports are still widely used within and between buildings. Maybe something similar could be retrofitted in here.
Most likely the sections that aren't being used as a tourist attraction, will end up with cabling. The first tunnel under the Thames, the Tower Subway, which was designed as an under-the-Thames foot tunnel, is now used as a super cable duct.
Chicago has a similar freight unnel network under the city streets. It is connected to the basement of many of the buildings downtown and a rail network provided delivery service for packages as well as coal for heating to the buildings. The network was shutdown in 1959 and largely forgotten. In 1992, one of the tunnels under the Chicago river was punctured. This flooded the system as well as two dozen buildings that still had open tunnel connections. The tunnels are now used primarily for utility and communication lines.
So, it didn't fail. The world changed, and it was no longer needed.
It's also not secret, you can just go on it if you visit the museum.
Sadly this is true for many things
Actually, it was deemed to expensive to run primarily because the stations above was not re-utilised, short term cost cutting for the sake of margins.
I used to take Opinion Formers on Mail Rail in the 1990’s when I was a Public Affairs Executive at The Post Office Corporation. We had a few carriages with plexiglass domes and seats for the MPs, Peers etc to sit in whilst we ran them around the network.
It was an incredible successful operation and transported vast amounts of mail daily. There was a proposal to extend the route to Willesden, the home of the Princess Royal Distribution Centre. The PRDC was the southern hub of the Travelling Post Office and the Networker system. We actually opened several dedicated Sorting Offices on the National Rail Network. My last opening event took place in Bristol.
When Mail volumes dropped and the reliability of EWS to deliver Mail by train became a massive problem, we looked at moving Mail to roads.
A study was undertaken to open Mail Rail to Oxford Street shops, and by doing so it would reduce the amount of vehicular traffic. But, the study showed that the idea wasn’t feasible and Mail Rail closed. The Travelling Post Office network also went the same way. The PRDC is now, from what I understand, mostly used as a vehicle hub?
PRDC was built on railway land with the hope that most of the mail would be transported by train. Several passenger trains were converted to carry containers for exclusive use by Royal Mail, even being painted Post office red in colour. A reversing spur was built for the trains at Kensal Rise on the high-level North London line at a considerable cost. However, train use reduced dramatically within a few years of its opening: now 50-foot long articulated lorries arrive every two minutes at the centre from all parts of the country. The 'mail rail' from Paddington was going to follow the route of the Bakerloo line which runs alongside the PRDC at Stonebridge Park. There are still a dozen derelict mail train carriages on a spur outside the centre after twenty years not moving!
I remember that proposal, but R.M had decided that along with the T.P.O. network it had to go.
Further to my previous message, Royal Mail has just announced that they will be ceasing using trains from next October. They have also ended the contract with DB Rail as from that date. The diesel lorries will be converted to electric vehicles over the next three years (yeah, of course!). {See the current "Rail" magazine for full details of this change.} This brings into question the compliance with planning permission for the £5 million depot.
@@cardiffian558 oh that’s interesting! One of my other jobs was to organise the “official opening” of the new hubs being built to accommodate the new networker style trains. Mostly they were just a big shed alongside the track where the train could be off-loaded of its York Roll containers.
My last event was at Bristol Parkway. We chartered a train and engine which took guests to the new depot. They were met on arrival by a jazz band and catering. Then the local mayor (I think) officially opened the “station”.
@@cardiffian558 my old boss was Alan Williams, I think he still writes for various Rail magazines? I believe he may even have a ride-on garden railway on his property?
Back when there were two deliveries a day - my grandmother said that she could send a letter in the morning, to her sister two miles away, and recieve a reply in the afternoon mail. This was before the they had telephones. :)
Regarding vacuum tube mail delivery, Paris adopted such a system which ran from 1868 all the way to 1984 allowing the delivery of urgent messages within minutes. The network covered 427km at it's maximum, and carried up to 30 million message per year. Today the network is no longer in use but some of the pumping stations responsible for the running of the system still exist.
Never knew this existed. I'm very fascinated with these tunnels, ngl. Thanks for sharing mate
Letter posted in Bristol would be sorted in Bristol, and if going to Manchester would be put on a train going to Manchester (not necessarily a Travelling Post Office train). On arrival in Manchester, it would then be sorted for the specific delivery round.
Yes, they were taken directly to Manchester. There was absolutely no point in sending them via London.
@@johnm2012 used to be the case, these days maybe not, I live in Hereford all our mails sorted in Birmingham, so we collect local mail load it on a lorry send it to Birmingham who sorts it puts it on another lorry and sends it back!
I remember being part of a group looking into the possibility of using the Mail Rail trains to deliver stock to the large retail outlets in Oxford Street, e.g. Selfridges. The trains passed just below the basements of these premises, so it was technically feasible.
I feel like that should be done still, or maybe the whole system could reconverted for parcel delivery? While barely any letters are sent anymore, parcel delivery and logistics sectors are bigger than ever! I feel like a huge amount of vehicles could be taken off the road and replaced with systems like this, with people on bikes and small autonomous vehicles being used to deliver said items from the nearest station to their final destination. I feel like it could still have a future and help efficiency and reduce pollution and congestion.
Mail Rail can be seen in action, in the Bruce Willis movie "Hudson hawk", where it is portrayed as "The Vatican's mail system". The extra's in the scene, are (or were) Mail Rail employees. Watch the film and you will see it in action.
Good to hear about this. Very interesting. One item - @3:50 … your reference to “an electronic railway..” it really would have been an “electric railway” - control systems would have been quite basic back then - consisting of mechanical switches, usually with human operators. Electronic ( even primitive electronics) controls didn’t really come into use until much later in the 20th century. So, even today - “electric” trains may be controlled electronically - but the train itself is electric.
Really good video - thank you for making and sharing it with the rest of us
This is the first time that I have come across this channel. I enjoyed it very much. Very professional, and enjoyable. So, I subscribed
I hosted a meeting with B.R. engineers at Mount Pleasant. After the meeting I arranged a visit to Mail Rail and we were shown all around the maintenance area. B.R. Engineers were very impressed with how clean the area was.
Backin the 1920’s mail delivery was next day or even same day! Grandad in business said there were several post deliveries to his work every working day!
Very true, up until about ten years ago we used to get morning post then late post in the afternoon. Now we only get something around mid-morning!
When I sorted mail (NZPO) in 1977-78 the saying was "Sorted today, delivered tomorrow".
We now have mail deliveries three times per week. In my area it's Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.
When I was a kid (50s/60s), mail arrived the next day, wherever you sent it (and all at one price!). If something didn't arrive before breakfast, it might come second delivery (around mid-morning), and if it still hadn't turned up, it would usually make it in the afternoon post. In some places there was an evening post as well (just like there were evening newspapers!). Then the two-tier system was introduced - first and second class - mail would still get there the next day, usually, but only first class was guaranteed to get there on time.
Then Sunday deliveries went and collections times were reduced (our nearest mail box, now has only one collection a day - at 7am! - and only on weekdays. We now get one delivery a day, usually about 10am, and only on weekdays. And even first class letters don't always get there the next (you have to pay extra for guaranteed next day delivery). Although, admittedly, I hardly ever send anything my post these days (even renewing passports - the example used in the video - can now be done online), and most of the post we get is junk mail, which goes straight in the recycling. I think we get more online deliveries via the Royal Mail than we do actual letters.
The final nail in the coffin (from my personal perspective, at least) was the introduction of different charges for different size and weights of letters. We now have a situation where we have very little idea of how much a letter or package is going to cost (and, even if we do, it's unlikely we have the right stamps to hand), so for almost anything I want to post, I now have to walk half a mile to the nearest post office, and queue up for at least 20 minutes. If you don't have a local post office, as many don't these days, you're buggered.
MailRail ended when the decision was taken to build a massive sorting centre in the outskirts of London. The location chosen has good links to the motorway network and is next to one of the main railway lines out of London. The gigantic sorting centre is located in Stonebridge Park NW10. There was no need to shift mail between the various London sorting depots and a railway station, as it could all be done in one gigantic centre, with modern automatic sorting machinary. The centre at Stonebridge Park is called The Princess Royal Distribution Centre.
Interesting, I used to ask about the history of that building when I visited on numerous occasions whilst delivering mail there. There were never any machines in the main expanse anymore… It just turned into some sort of cross dock facility for mail arriving from different places to be reshuffled about in the yorks and then back out on lorrie‘s again
Very interesting. I knew a lot about 'Mail Rail' already, but this is one of the best videos I've seen about it. Must actually go and see it!
Top quality and always interesting topics!
The incompetence of Royal Mail that should never have been split to from the Post Office. Love the American pronunciation of DEPOT😂
[Love the American pronunciation of DEPOT] ???
Americans pronounce it DEE poh. Unless we're talking about removing a small plant from its round ceramic home.
One of my first jobs many moons ago involved me going to Mount Pleasant often and I was always fascinated by the massive Post Office HQ there.
I worked under a bloke who was fascinated by such things and would regularly share war stories and the like.
Thanks for the vid. It's answered questions I never asked.
I did not know this about London at all, how interesting!
I had hear about this system, however I had NO IDEA it was the lynchpin of the UK postal system... great documentary, thank you!
Superb video, actually going and getting the access rather than sitting on stock footage or simply visiting like everyone else.
Thank you for a charming look into yesteryear. I remember seeing these mail trains in an old "Boys Own Annual" books from the 1950s/60s . :)
I remember reading about the Post Office railway in the London Transport Magazine back sometime in the early fifties. My Father was a London Transport employee (worked at the Acton works), so he got the magazine regularly. The PO railway was featured as something which would be of interest to the the staff of London Transport, especially the railwaymen.
Great video, and you should definitely do one on the Thames Tideway Tunnel, if you haven't done already, since that's going to have a massive effect on our lives with the majority of people not even knowing it exists!
So, moving the main sorting office and Blair/Brown nationalisation spelled the end.
Great video. The sewers (the new one too) and the river Fleet are other underground London marvels.
Actually, mail would be delivered the very next day, not in a couple of days. And mail posted within a town or city would often be delivered the same day!
Very interesting that these existed and that I've never heard of it! Great work!
I've been looking for any underground mystery's anywhere in the world so please share more
Rail mail had an open day some time in the 80's and my Dad took me to see it.
I don't really remember much about it but do remember being taken on a ride through the tunnels in a train adapted for carrying people.
Exceptionally well done video. Thank you.
This was so ahead of its time
Fascinating to see what this Mail railway was built for delivering mail underneath Central London. Long before Crossrail came which is now the Elizabeth Line.
Great video! I know you mentioned the (then) new Royal Mail terminus that was built out in West London at Princess Royal… The irony of that now is that Royal Mail have also decided to stop all trains running out of there delivering mail across the country and reverting to an all lorry service only! It’s crazy given the pressures on trying to be environmentally friendly and a big privately run company like that is clearly putting profits over doing what’s right.
If memory serves there were eight platforms I think at PRDC, which gradually got reduced down to only two or three I think when I was there last a few months ago. Rumour is that PRDC is on leased ground and the government wants it to turn it into some sort of maintenance terminal for the HS2 railway line
Beautifully edited and made!
I remember hearing MailRail trains passing by whilst on the platform waiting for my UndergrounD train home at Bond Street Central line station
Love hearing more about the Mail Rail!
I love seeing this railway, it was years ahead of it's time, and such an interesting line
It was created back then UK was still the most innovative country in the whole world, those brilliant lads back then truly wanted to create a better world, unlike today.
It actually only took 1 day from Bristol to Manchester until about 2000 and reliability was near to 100%. The railway was only abandoned when next dat delivery was abandoned.
The other thing to note is that hardly any mail is sent by rail anymore.i believe the terminal in West London is Willesden. This survived very short time e. For its intended use. I believe it’s still used but nothing like the volumes it was built for. I took a trip on it last Christmas, I’d recommend anyone to do the same.
I had the opportunity to see the mail railway when I was apprenticed to Sperry Gyroscope as they maintained the embedded microcontroller that ran the railway. The also manufactured and maintained the STD drum equipment used by the GPO( now BT)
It can still be used if they thought of using it for the major post carriers like Amazon, UPS, and the Royal Mail by expanding it to a hib that handles the large amounts of mail to be sorted out for delivery
My Grandfather worked on the mail rail from its early days through to the mid 60s.
I know about about it from what my grandmother told me after he died and I was a bit older.
Stop bullshitting. I worked for royal mail and it was shut as the 8 London mail centres were shut down to 2. It was due to falling letter numbers. That's why they have just stopped sending mail by air this year. Also the reason they got rid off the travelling post office ( TPO) on the railway. That's why the service is terrible now. Letters being left in the slots for days at a time because the posties walks are far too big. It's all about money now and not service. When I worked as a postie not one letter could be left undelivered, or you would be done for wilfully delay and sacked. All this mail not being delivered for days at a ti.E are with the managers blessing. It's all about parcels now. And then the CEO of RM got caught bullshiting parliament. He was a little sniffling knob anyway.
I work with Odoo for a legal courier (ironically for this video) and Odoo really does not have such and intuitive web-building programme. You must have been sent a secret programme to 'test'. It's irritably clunky and clow and you can't choose much of the styles for yourself.
Apart from plugging a very baffling business programme - this video is great!
Margret Thatcher, privatisation.... should I go on?!
I see you have the T-shirt as well. lol
Yup
This a good video keep it up!
Watching it now, found this legitimately interesting.
Under Chicago was a coal/ash subway. It can be seen the The Blues Brothers when they are on the floor with Princes Leah unloading an M16 at them.
I always knew from a young age, this Postal Railway operated, simply because I had an interest in railways.
City Hall Station in NYC is another bit of abandoned underground infrastructure that'd be awesome to see more of if you ever got the chance.
My great grandma would send freshly picked fruit and veg from Speyside (in Scotland) where she lived to relatives in London. They were picked in the morning and delivered the same day. This would have been ~20's or 30's. All via Royal Mail.
14:30 Here's one for you:
Even fewer people know of its existence, but if you want an abandoned tunnel urbex/planning archive challenge, how about digging up any information you can on the abandoned freight tunnel from Harrods Depository on the southern bank of the river Thames near Barnes to the eponymous tourist trap, sorry, high class store in Knightsbridge‽
Great stuff. Seems a shame to end that way. I was a BR Signalman 1978-88, and fancied a look here; but never did.
Interesting to see how this Underground Mail railway was used underneath Central London before Crossrail (now Elizabeth Line was built). Very interesting.
I am surprised that the likes of Amazon or another parcel company have not taken it over and extended it.
London is already full and complicated, above the ground and underground!!!
12:10
"royal mail has been told they can no longer use the main London terminals for their overground trains"
Feels like some missing info here... Why? And what station in west London?? I can't find (from an admittedly quick search) any reference to this on wiki or the mail rail website either.
The station he referred to is at Willesden Junction, also known as Princess Royal distribution Centre. Had multiple platforms for the trains to arrive and depart from but over the years most of the platforms were closed off with only two or three surviving and even those have been withdraw now as Royal mail has decided to move all train mail onto The motorway network
I wonder if any companies have ever approached royal mail about using the mail rail to streamline transport between distribution centres.
A tunnel under london is definitely valuable infrastructure anyway
I love infrastructure like this. I hope they find new use for this. I'm surprised some big company hasn't found a way to utilize it in tandem with their business or maybe the government finding some kind of way to use it.. Idk. It just seems valuable and useful
As stated in comments, this is a tourist attraction now
As an engineer the second you said 'wasnt designed for people' i knew exactly what you were speaking about 😂
Many people of my age learned about this system when it was showcased on the kids program “Blue Peter” in the sixties.
Another system also existed in london called the London Necropolis Railway that was used to carry bodies out of london to the cemeteries surrounding. Worth looking into.
But that wasn't a subway
I read that the necropolis railway took funeral parties out to Surrey and back again, so it was a passenger railway, as well as a means of moving the deceased.
It could still be useful for parcel delivery.
Great informative video! 😃
It would be nice to explain how the trains work. If anyone would like to see a train away from the tunnels, the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre at Quainton has one in its museum.
Great as usual
As an urban explorer I found it interesting to explore and even better because I’ve been to all the stations and Saw rare locomotives that you don’t see in the museum I believe that are not accessible anymore it’s sad to see it rot away and flood and only one part of mail rail is still accessible on the loop mount Pleasant fun fact of mail rail they was going to turn it in to a bicycle tunnel for people but the plan never went through also cross rail to go through but never happen either which is nice so it’s still all one tunnel still most of mail rail is capped or locked with few entry points one station which had me amazed was king Edward building bank that had concrete pumped into it when i looked to me it was a mixture of small and bigger stations like Paddington rathbone place and Liverpool Street station and Whitechapel seemed bigger than the rest of the stations all round loved it and best railway in London
Really interesting vid 🙂
It "failed" like steam engines "failed:" something replaced it after working perfectly well.
It served most district offices north of the thames now those offices are just delivery offices.All collections
are now dealt with in mail centers outside London.Tharefore the Post Office Railway is not required.
really interesting, and well made ⭐
You can still ride it now! Comes with a Mail Museum ticket!
Wow, very interesting !!!
it's not abandoned. i've been on it. it's now a tourist attraction where you can travel between two station in specially designed trains. just look it up.
Only a small part is open for tourists
Most of it is abandoned. Seems wasteful that it cannot be reused in some capacity, considering the amount of work that went it tunnelling etc.
Underground topic suggestion: Sewers!
Interesting!
Y'all used to have like 5 or 6 postal deliveries a day in Victorian London, didn't you? Unreal!
I needed to know why they couldn’t dig a tunnel and do an extension for most of the mainline Trains so that they could extend the unused abandoned underground train stations. Why couldn’t they use the part D78 Stock train doors on the sides and also restructure the front face of the A60 and A62 stock which will include the class 507, class 508, class 313, class 314 and class 315 remix and make them all together and also redesign all of them into an overhead wire line trains and also make most of them into Five carriages per units and also having three Disabled Toilets on those Five cars per units A60 and A62 stock trains and also convert the A60 and A62 stock trains into a Gardner 6LXC, Cummins M11, Volvo B10M, Gardner 6LXB, Gardner LG1200 and Gardner 8LXB Diesel Engines and also put the Loud 8-Speed Voith Gearboxes even Loud 10-Speed Leyland Hydra cyclic Gearboxes in the A60 and A62 stock, class 507, class 508, class 313, class 314, and class 315 and also modernise the A60 and A62 stock and make it into 11 carriages per unit so it could have fewer doors, more tables, computers and mobile phone chargers? A Stock Train and 8 Disabled Toilets on those A stock trains. why couldn’t we refurbish and modernise the waterloo and city line Triple-Track train tunnel and make it even much more Larger and extend it to the bank station, making it into a Triple-Track Railway Line so those Five countries such as Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden to convert the waterloo and city line Triple-Track Railway tunnel into a High-Speed Railway lines? The Third Euro tunnel Triple-Track Railway line to make it 11 times better for passengers so they could go from A to B. Then put the modernised 11 carriages per unit A Stock and put them on a bigger modernised Waterloo and city line Triple-Track train tunnel so it could go to bank station to those Five countries such as Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden. The modernised refurbished 11 carriages per unit A stock could be a High Speed The Third Triple-Track Euro Tunnel Train So it is promising and 47 times a lot more possible to do this kind of project if that will be OK for London Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden. oh by the way, could they also tunnel the Triple-Track Railway Line so it will stop from Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex so that the Passengers will go to Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland and Sweden and also extend the Triple-Track Railway Line from the Bank to Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex Stations so that more people from there could go to Australia, Germany, Italy, Poland And Sweden more Easily. Why couldn't they extend the Piccadilly Line and also build brand-new underground train stations so it could go even further right up to Clapton, Wood Street can they also make another brand new underground train station in Chingford and could they extend the Piccadilly Line and the DLR right up to Chingford? All of the classes 150, 155, 154, 117, 114, 105, and 106, will be replaced by all of the Gardner 6LXC, Cummins M11, Volvo B10M, Gardner 6LXB, Gardner LG1200 and Gardner 8LXB Diesel Five carriages three disabled toilets are air conditioning trains including Highams Park for extended roots which is the Piccadilly line and the DLR trains. Could you also convert all of the 1973 stock trains into an air-conditioned maximum speed 78 km/hours (48 MPH) re-refurbished and make it into a 8 cars per unit if that will be alright, and also extend all of the Piccadilly train stations to make more space for all of the extended 8 car per unit 1973 stock air condition trains and can you also build another Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive Companies and can they order Every 87 Octagon and Every 48 Hexagon shape LNER diagram unique small no.13 and unique small no.11 Boilers from those Countries such as Greece, Italy, Poland, and Sweden, can they make Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive speeds by up to 147MPH so you can try and test it on the Original Mainline so it will be much more safer for the Passengers to enjoy the 147MPH speed Limit only for HS2 and Channel Tunnel mainline services, if they needed 16 Carriages Per units, can they use those class 55’s, class 44’s, class 40’s and class 43HST Diesel Locomotive’s right at the Back of those 18 Carriages Per Units so they can take over at the Back to let those Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive’s have a rest for those interesting Journeys Please!!!!, oh can you make all of those 18 Tonne Boxes of Coal for all of those 147MPH Mayflower and Tornado Steam Locomotive’s so the Companies will Understand us PASSENGER’S!!!! So please make sure that the Builders can do as they are told!!!!!!!!!!!! And PLEASE do something about these very very important Professional ideas Please? Prime Minister of England, Prime Minister of Australia, Prime Minister of Sweden, Prime Minister of Germany, Prime Minister of Italy, Prime Minister of Poland and that Includes the Mayor of London.
For goodness sake!
Put some punctuation in.
Break up the text with some paragraphs!
Then more people might bother to read your (actually quite interesting and certainly detailed) stream of consciousness.
Which, I presume, is what all we commenters ultimately want.
Wow!! Amazing video!! Wow!! I know this from The Amazing Race!!
A very interesting video
Im thinking a look into the London sewer network could be interesting, starting with The Great Stink.
I cannot think how something like this would be good for things like delivery companies today. It would greatly reduce the lorry and cars on the road
That's a very weird graph at 2:39. The axis goes from 50 to 100 to 500?
Shanghai is experimenting with transporting goods through their metro network using autonomous pods, so the idea is still very much alive
Surely they could use to move parcels and goods from one side of London to the other.
In a year or two Royal Mail will cease to exist! I work for a company that shifts most of the UK's mail now. The Post Office put up prices so much they have put THEMSELVES out of business by cheaper FASTER competition. Shame the tunnels cant be used aspassenger lines made bigger ti the size of normal tube likes? GREAT VIDEO.
As always, one why leads to another. Why did the government require the postal service to stop using London's mainline stations? I will now have to research into that.
You just KNOW that some of those workers got a quick lift sometimes on those trains...
“I emailed a railway museum to ask for a tour and was surprised when they agreed”
It wasn't unknown. I knew about it from a feature in the Eagle comic before I was 11. That was in the 1950s
BT Tunnels under London next please...
That rail network has really economic value today thanks to thanks to the huge jump in package shipping thanks to Amazon. Slip so FC or Distros on top of the old station
It's not really a network as there's only one line, extending from Paddington to Whitechapel with some fancy (but not networky) trackwork at Mount Pleasant.
I cannot help but think that it must be cheaper to expand the diameter of these existing tunnels than build completely new ones outright - perhaps they could be redone to double as a new underground line. Large profile like the Elizabeth line would probably not be feasible, but small profile such as the piccadilly line should be doable. Wonder why TFL didn't at least study that proposal.
However in the deeper analysis the route is broadly served now by the Elizabeth Line itself and expanding tunnels is more complicated than running a TBM through virgin ground.
You privatise the major stations first: Paddington and Liverpool streets, then you make the sustainable project obsolete.
Something wrong with the audio mix, after the first minute the voice over goes really low in volume.
as south east asian, specifically in bandung, hopefully our public transportation getting better.
Has absolutely nothing to do with this video
Very interesting
It's not a city thing but the US state of Florida was millions of miles of natural underground tunnels full of fresh water that zing and zang all over the place . Many are so big people can sub throw them.