On PBS tonight; the program "Nova" episode is "Super Tunnel" About Crossrail in London

One thing I am hoping to learn from this program is what types of artifacts they have been finding. It seems that no matter where you dig in London, you are bound to find something Celtic, Medieval, Tudor, or from Roman Britain.

Also hope to learn exactly what locations Crossrail will serve, and how it will connect to existing tube and rail stations.

Thank you for the heads' up, Rebecca! It's on the Denver PBS station tonight also.

You're welcome, Andi! I think all of us here on the Forum who love London will want to see this program.

Thanks from me too. I set it to record as I wasn't sure if there were baseball playoff games tonight...lol!!

Hi Pam! I am recording it too, because I know I'll want to watch it more than once.

Found this article on Wikipedia. Lots of good information. Click on the route pictured about one-third of the way through the article to get an idea of where it will go.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossrail

"One thing I am hoping to learn from this program is what types of artifacts they have been finding."

On a program I saw a few months ago, they have found a few plague pits.

You can visit the actual project site at http://www.crossrail.co.uk/ It will show the project timeline, what the connecting stations will be and all sorts of info.

Thanks Sam! Will check it out.

harleydonski, thanks! Very interesting.

Enjoy - I don't to pass any spoilers.

PBS didn't disappoint. I'm watching it now and it is so fascinating and much more suspenseful than I expected. The "eye of the needle" segment was amazing.

The Crossrail program was very good. It covered several points.
1. The route. A new line in from Heathrow Airport that would mean travel time is only 28 minutes into London's West End. There are other new lines, but this was the only one mentioned by the program.
2. I learned that this is the largest engineering project currently going on in Europe, with 40 work sites in London.
3. There was an in-depth description of the giant boring machines being used to dig the tunnels, called "TBM's". 8 of them are being used. They are each 490 feet long and weigh 1,000 tons each.
4. There will be 10 new stations in London. 75 miles of new railway. 26 miles of new tunnels.
5. At the east end of Oxford Street lies Tottenham Court Road Station. Crossrail is building a new station here which will link into the Northern Line and Central Line, creating a new "Super Hub". The bore for this is the tightest bore being undertaken by Crossrail. It will pass 14 inches below the existing escalators at Tottenham Court station, and 33 inches above the existing platform and live, running Northern Line. This bore is called by Crossrail engineers "The Eye Of The Needle".
6. Protecting buildings by installing a system of lasers pointed at "targets". These are installed all over London, on buildings, and detect even the slightest shift of buildings due to boring underneath them. The information goes to a central computer that is monitored 24 hours a day. The area around Soho Square was covered to illustrate this point. They used the House of St Barnabas as an example of a historic building they are trying to protect.
7. The new Canary Wharf Station, which is being built in the water's edge in a huge waterproof concrete box sunken into the riverbed, was covered. Will have a roof garden on the top, sort of a greenhouse area.
8. The destruction of the old Connaught Tunnel under the River Thames, and the building of the new larger tunnel that replaces it was covered.
9. The new Crossrail line will connect London City Airport into its network.
10. Crossrail is scheduled to be up and running in 2018.

The program did not mention any artifacts that have been found. This was not covered at all.

Thanks Rebecca, that was great, it's just incredible what we pull off these days. It reminded me of an episode of "Super Skyscrapers," also on PBS, that looked at construction of the Leadenhall Building in London a couple years ago. I don't see it available at PBS, though you can see some previews from other cities, or buy the series dvd, but here's a You Tube link to the Leadenhall episode-it's completely amazing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5RgRboBE2Y

http://www.pbs.org/program/super-skyscrapers/

Thanks Dave! Good links!

Wow, a ton of interesting stuff here, thanks Sam.

http://www.crossrail.co.uk/sustainability/archaeology/

Wow, another great link. Thanks Dave!

This is so interesting. The show will be on in So Cal Saturday evening. All set to record.
.

Thanks for the summary, Rebecca. I watched part of it but not all. I wish Nova would drop the hokey suspense music and just tell the story straight up. "Reality TV" needs flash-and-pop, actual reality doesn't.

Hi Rebecca,
You may be interested to know that the NOVA Super Tunnel episode is a one-hour reversion of a 3-part BBC documentary series I made, which features far more information and areas of the project, including plenty on the archaeology (especially in episode3)!! The three episodes can be found on YouTube - the series was called 'The Fifteen Billion Pound Railway' - here are the links:
Ep1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42-lJ2y6ddQ
Ep2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0pghtGMakQ
Ep3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BdWmex3k-4&index=3&list=PL7bEs9vz9aVXD6z6OTGwmFurjU-IN4Vz4
Let me know if you can't get the YouTube links to work...
Enjoy! x

Yes I was thinking about that but couldn't remember what it was called.

Rebecca - thanks for starting this thread. I knew nothing about the show, but now have set my DVR to record it!

Tim, Dick, Marco, and Harold, thanks for your interest in Crossrail!

Mr. Joby, thanks for the YouTube links!

I have been following the progress of this project for several years now, with great interest.
I began reading articles about it in 2012 and 2013 on BBC.
"Crossrail dig unearths forgotten London": (complete with skeletons, Roman coins, and a Bronze Age Track):
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-20796351
"Bronze Age Transport Route Found During Crossrail Dig:
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-19834203
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-21196456

Too bad the Bronze Age Track cannot have a museum and a shelter built over it, and have it opened to the public. Such an interesting find. But land is so valuable in London, it must be dug up for the project to continue, or concrete put down on top of it. Such a shame. Would just love to know how much really terrific stuff is buried underneath buildings and roads in London. These Bronze Age Tracks (also called "Sweet Tracks") were mostly built around 3900 BC, about 400 to 1000 years before Stonehenge.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweet_Track

An interesting website is that of the Museum of London Archaeology, a division/partner of the Museum of London.
http://www.mola.org.uk/

Yes, the MOLA archeology team working on the Crossrail project is huge, and very intelligently the schedule for the construction has hundreds of extra weeks built in (across all 40 worksites) to accommodate all the archeological work that they expect will be required. I was very lucky to have spent several days working on the site during the uncovering of the Roman roads at Liverpool Street and the Charterhouse Square plague pits at the Farringdon site. We have also been working to document the removal and reinterment of thousands of bodies at the former Bethlem Hospital (Bedlam) site near Moorgate for the BBC - this is a truly huge undertaking and has been little reported in the news. I'm thrilled that so many people abroad are so interested in the Crossrail project!! Warm regards from London!

I missed the original screening of the show, but it played many times and I was able to record it last night! Thanks.

Mr. Joby, thanks for the additional information!

For those in my viewing area, the program repeats tonight (Saturday Oct. 15th) at midnight on our local PBS station, Channel 8.

If anyone missed the episode or doesn't have access to cable, many shows on PBS can be found at www.pbs.org They seem to have a rather extensive library of past PBS shows.

It's available on the PBS iOS app as well.

Why are programmes like this on PBS in America yet are on mainstream channels in the UK? Is simply not considered worthy of gaining high enough ratings for commercial channels?

Why are programmes like this on PBS in America yet are on mainstream channels in the UK?

James, because the BBC (who originally made this as 3 x 1 hour episodes), is THE mainstream channel in the UK, followed by the commercial channels (ITV, Channel 4, Sky etc.). The BBC has no adverts. The same is true of other Europen countries, ARD (Germany), SF1/SF2 (Switzerland), FR1 (France) are all the major channels and are non profit making (some have adverts at limited times of day).
So why is PBS not a mainstream channel in the USA?

Mr, Joby kindly posted links to the original version on You Tube.

Ep1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42-lJ2y6ddQ
Ep2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0pghtGMakQ
Ep3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BdWmex3k-4

I watched them this weekend, very good but now 2 years old. They appear to have been made in 2014. It would be nice to see a follow up about actually getting the track, stations and trains running, which is what is currently happening.
One statistic, which has mentioned but only briefly: 1500 passengers per train. One train every 2½ minutes in each direction. That is a lot of people shifting.

Many thanks Chris F for the explanation. I still would have thought that such programmes would have attracted enough viewers to attract an advertising revenue in the US rather than the ‘begging’ statements that appear on PBS. BTW, PBS is now available in the UK on Freesat.

Thanks Chris. James, I had rather donate to my local PBS station during their fundraising events than watch advertisements like regular TV. That's just my take on it.

PBS UK (formally PBS USA) shows adverts.

For those in the UK the original documentaries are being run every now and again on Quest. In fact one of them is on right as I write this message.