Here in the city, they build for the sky-Under the Channel, they went down to fight the sea.
This was an old dream, from Napoleon time, made real with steel - the fight is always with the rock, ancient stuff. Here long before blood and bone.
The key was the rock itself with a gray line of chalk marl under the sea floor - It is strong enough to hold, soft enough to cut, and it kept the water out.
Drilled holes from platforms in the waves to be sure of the path, you had to stay on that line.
The work was mean, done by eleven great steel worms, Tunnel Boring Machines. These were factories on the move through the dark.
The head was mean, had these tungsten teeth that chewed the chalk-More machines hauled the muck away - The tail lined the hole with concrete as it moved, three tunnels were made, two for trains, one for service. They came from England and from France, guided by a lasers light in the black.
So you had two machines, they chewed rock toward a place they could not see. They touched in 1990. It was off by just centimeters but mean work, all pressure and measurement.