File:Hudson and Manhattan tunnels - uniting New York and New Jersey in picture and story. (1908) (14779339053).jpg

Identifier: hudsonmanhattant00durs (find matches)
Title: Hudson & Manhattan tunnels : uniting New York and New Jersey in picture and story.
Year: 1908 (1900s)
Authors: Durst, Seymour B., 1913-, former owner. NNC
Subjects: Port Authority Trans-Hudson Corporation Hudson and Manhattan Railroad Company Tunnels
Publisher: New York : American Photograph Co.
Contributing Library: Columbia University Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: The Durst Organization

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onel Haskins, compressed air wasfirst used in construction, when its aid and usefulness in subterranean construction wasclearly proven. Haskins even used compressed air as a means of removing from thetunnel the sand and silt, first having mixed them with water. Since those days, how-ever, the use of compressed air in sub-aquatic engineering has made great, importantand rapid strides toward the perfect system used by the Hudson and Manhattan com-pany in the construction of these tubes. Pilot Tunneling. From the time when Haskins drove a pilot tunnel (six feet sixinches in diameter, thirty or forty feet in advance of the main works, enabling him tolay stronger foundations for the roofing irons and brick and masonry of which he wasconstructing his tunnel), to the introduction of the high-pressure air chambered shieldused by the Hudson company, there has been a wonderful advance in engineering science.Behind this shield men can labor without fear of cave-in as the high air-pressure in the
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Toward the curve under the mighty Hudson, and we are at our journeys end. chamber holds the mud, sand, and silt in place until loosened and removed with pick,shovel or dynamite. The shield is several inches larger than the diameter of the com-pleted bore, thus allowing room for the placing of the construction materials. In thepresent tunnels, these are huge rings of steel securely cemented and bolted together,and sheathed with concrete either all or a part of the way around the circle. The shieldis forced forward into the soil by huge jack-screws, and its correct path is maintainedto the fraction of an inch by careful mathematical calculation. Electricity was alsoused as a means of both light and power in the construction work, greatly facilitatingthe speed and accurate completion of the undertaking. The Tubes. Each tube is fifteen feet three inches in diameter, and lies from sixtyto ninety feet below the surface of the water, or from fifteen to thirty feet below thebed of the river.

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