DC08-359 October 15, 2008
Secret WW2 tunnels up for sale
Secret tunnels under Holborn in the heart of London are on the property market as BT prepares to market one of the capital’s most unusual properties. The Kingsway Tunnels are a around 1 mile long, about the length of 14 football pitches, and were originally built in 1940 as air raid shelters. They have been used by MI6, the Public Record Office (PRO) and BT, and are now surplus to requirement.
BT Property, which looks after the company’s global property portfolio, has instructed agents to find a buyer for the site. With a prime city centre address underneath High Holborn, the tunnels are expected to be most attractive to a Governmental organisation or major company with the facilities to bring them back into productive use.
Elaine Hewitt, Group Property Director for BT, said: “BT has a large and amazingly varied estate which reflects the company’s heritage as well as its transformation into a modern global communications business. These tunnels were taken over by the Post Office, BT’s predecessor, after the Second World War and have been used in all sorts of weird and wonderful ways since then. Today, however, we have no further use for them and are looking to find a buyer who can seize this amazing opportunity. This really is a once in a lifetime chance!”
Originally designed to provide air raid accommodation for approximately 8,000 people, the tunnels were equipped with full water, electricity and services – all 100 feet below the ground.
Since then, the tunnels have been used by the Government as a secure ‘reserve war room’, by the PRO to store 400 tons of highly sensitive documents, and by BT as a ‘trunk exchange’ connecting long distance calls before the introduction of the STD (subscriber trunk dialling) code. In the 1950s, the site gained some notoriety because the then-famous ‘hot line’ that connected the presidents of the USA and Russia was routed directly through the exchange. In the 1980s, the complex was home to BT’s London Area Group that serviced closed circuit television and the tunnels also housed secure data back up services.
The property is now being offered to the market for purchasers with the resources and profile suited to re-using the site. Sadly, however, restrictions mean there is no opportunity for the tunnels to become a smart new hotel, home or office.
Hewitt, said, “We are looking for a purchaser with the imagination and stature to return the tunnels to productive use. The site has the most fantastic history and, now that we have no requirement for it for telecommunications use, it is right that we should offer it to the market. Here’s hoping it has a fantastic future as well.”
While the property is being marketed for sale, BT will also consider leasing the site to an appropriate party.
Brief history
1942 WWII air raid shelters
1944 MI6 storage
1945 Public Records Office storage
1946 Transferred to the Post Office
1984 Transferred to BT as part of privatisation.
