Sydney Tunnels Tour: New Underground Adventures

• Underground tours in Sydney are set to commence later this year
• Abandoned train tunnels 20 metres below the Sydney CBD will open to the public
• St James Tunnels have undergone a million-dollar makeover
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Viewing from atop the Sydney Harbour Bridge or aboard the Manly ferry is practically a guaranteed part of a visit to Sydney nowadays. It’s a given. If you’re looking for a more unique tour experience in Sydney, the NSW Government has just the thing for you.

A series of abandoned train tunnels that sit 20 meters beneath the Sydney CBD have been restored and revitalised to create a new underground experience. Built in the 1920s, the St James Tunnels extend under Hyde Park and were never put into action, instead being used as a World War II air raid shelter.

Tours like Bridgeclimb on the Harbour Bridge are now a must-do experience for Sydney locals and visitors alike. In time, we want to see tours of the St James Tunnels become just as popular – Minister for Transport, John Graham.

New underground tours in Sydney

The guided tours will wind through almost one kilometer of disused “ghost” tunnels that were originally part of a grand underground railway plan that never came to pass. Almost 100 years later, they are being given a lease of new life. Combining a historical walking tour with an immersive multimedia and soundscape experience, this new tour experience will offer visitors a new perspective of the city’s transport and its wartime past.

For the past two years, Dark Spectrum has installed an illuminating light show, laser beams and electronic museum in stretches of the historic subterranean tunnels as part of Vivid Sydney. And Sydneysiders went mad for it. So the new underground tours are bound to be a success in Sydney.

A proven success

In the UK, the London Transport Museum has been running a series of Hidden London guided tours for the past few years, taking visitors beneath the city’s streets into disused parts of the world’s first underground railway network. They have been a huge success, too, being names Best Hidden Gem in the World at the Tiqets Remarkable Venue Awards 2022, as well as Best Hidden Gem in the UK.

Sydney Trains Chief Executive Matt Longland said:

We are very excited be part of this unique transport project which is turning a once disused and unseen heritage site into a fascinating, interactive and educational visitor experience. The St James Tunnels are a window into our transport past, a snapshot of World War II history, and the efforts of the workers who built Sydney’s transport infrastructure.

The tour is set to commence later this year and will run several times a day and will be suitable for visitors aged 13 and above. Here’s hoping the underground tours in Sydney will be as successful as their London counterpart.

Featured image: TheParliamentarian_ via Reddit

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