An Interactive Tour Of London's New Crossrail

For everyone in London who is curious about all the construction going on underground, this interactive video tour of London’s new Crossrail provides fascinating insight into a major feat of engineering that has been going on beneath London’s city streets for the past three years. It’s also pretty darn fun to play with in its own right, allowing viewers to manipulate the video’s perspective as they travel down the Crossrail’s newly constructed tunnels. If you’ve always wanted to operate a locomotive, here’s your (virtual) chance.

The Crossrail is an ambitious project that began construction in 2012, aimed at improving transit into and across London and relieving some of the city’s overburdened Underground lines. Workers recently completed the gargantuan task of digging out 26 miles of new tunnels beneath London, with the help of eight massive tunnel boring machines, which, delightfully, have names like “Victoria” and “Phyllis.” The new tunnels are lined with 250 thousand concrete segments, weighing over 6,600 pounds a piece. In short, these tunnels are not joking around.

According to Crossrail’s intro to the video tour,

This interactive 360° film was shot from the front of one of Crossrail’s construction locomotives as it journeyed from Stepney Green cavern to Farringdon. The construction locomotives are used to carry people and materials through the tunnels.

Viewers can alter the video’s perspective to look in any direction as the construction locomotive moves down the tunnel.

For example, you can look ahead, and see this:

Or swivel around to look back at the construction locomotive operator.

Test it out for yourself below. If you’re using a desktop or laptop, move the screen by dragging it with your mouse or use the arrowed control panel at the top left of the screen. If you have a mobile device or tablet, “scroll around the video using your touch screen, or by moving the device left, right, up or down.” If you want to be among the first to test out the new underground transit system in real life, start saving your pennies now, as Crossrail services are set to begin in 2018.

Images: YouTube (3)