Mersey Tunnels Police

The Queensway Tunnel

From 1920 onwards the lengthening queues of cars and lorries waiting to use the Car Ferry made it obvious that the coming of the car had initiated a second major transport revolution and unless it could be more adequately catered for, the continuing growth and prosperity of Merseyside could be very serious jeopardised. In 1922 on the initiative of the Liverpool City Council a representative co-ordinating committee was set up to investigate and report on a new Mersey road crossing, either by bridge or tunnel. The committee consulted 3 engineers, Sir Basil Mott, Sir Maurice Fitzmaurice and Mr John H Broadie, who were unanimously in favour of a tunnel crossing. With a project of such magnitude the many financial and legal problems involved caused delays and it was not until the 8th August 1925 that a private bill authorising the project received Royal assent. On the 16th December 1925 at George's dock site Liverpool, HRH The Princess Royal turned on the power for the pneumatic drill using a gold key thus; formally inaugurating an undertaking without parallel in engineering history. The construction of the tunnel took 9 years to complete and at the height of its construction 1700 men were employed. The tunnel was engineered on a grand scale its builders could be pardoned for believing they had solved the problem of cross-river traffic for the foreseeable future. Completed in 1934 officially opened and named Queensway on July 18th by King George V amidst a lot of pomp and ceremony. The tunnel measures 2.13 miles long with four 9ft traffic lanes and 2 branch tunnels one either side of the river.

With the phenomenal growth of road traffic combined with considerable industrial development in the area traffic through the tunnel would rapidly reach saturation point, this is something that could not have been foreseen at the time the scheme was conceived. In it's first year of operation 3 million vehicles used the tunnel and by 1959 this figure had swollen to 11 million. The tunnel was already being congested at peak periods causing gridlock in both Liverpool and Birkenhead. In 1968 no less than 17 million vehicles passed through the tunnel whilst an astonishing total of over 60,000 vehicles were recorded during a single 24-hour period. Up to and including this time the operation of the tunnel was undertaken by the Mersey Tunnel Joint Committee MTJC comprising 10 members appointed by Liverpool Corporation and 7 by Birkenhead Corporation. The MTJC were totally responsible for the day to day running of the tunnel.