CHUNNEL: THE HEAT IS ON
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• While the money watchers are obsessed with the chances of the Channel tunnel getting the funds it needs, the transport watchers will be more concerned with the practical operational problems which are now beginning to raise their heads. If it is true that the temperatures inside the tunnel will he in the order of 30°C, then there will be a host of problems. Coach passengers will not be amused, to put it mildly, if they are asked to sit in their compulsorily-non-air-conditioned seats for 40 minutes in those conditions. Owners of reefers will be less than amused if their precious cargoes do not make the transition from independent refrigeration to the tunnel's electricity and back to their own sources smoothly. Drivers sitting in their cabs in that heat, with no on-board ventilation, will hardly be any more enthusiastic.
All these problems, or variations on them, would have cropped up had the Chunnel been made a road tunnel, with thousands of vehicle engines heating the air, in addition to the heat sources which will warm up the rail tunnel. They are problems which should be sorted out — and sorted out quickly — if the Chunnel is to he anything other than an under-used white elephant trail under the sea. If that were to be the case, everyone would lose, for the cost of the Chunnel eventually will be borne by every operator, no matter what form of cross-channel transport — if any — that he uses.