The Channel Tunnel is an in fact three tunnels going undersea under the Channel between France and England. This is the first time England has been linked to mainland Europe for thousands of years (a spit of land once linked them). Two of these tunnels are for trains and one is a service tunnel. The building of the Channel Tunnel was started in 1987 and finished in 1994. It has been dug 40 meters below the sea bed and the undersea section is 37 kilometres long. The actual tunnels are about 50 kilometres long. The English terminal is at Folkestone which is close to Dover. The French terminal is at Coquelles near Calais. The trains transport vehicles, freight and passengers.

Eurotunnel is the company that owns the Channel Tunnel until 2086. Eurotunnel designed the Channel Tunnel. The Eurotunnel trains transport vehicles such as cars, motorbikes, coaches and trucks. Eurotunnel also allows other trains to pass through the tunnel. Eurostar is the train that passes through the other tunnel and it goes from the Gare du Nord to London Waterloo. Some trains stop at Lille, Calais-Frethun and Ashford during the journey. The line is being extended and as of November the trains will go all the way to London St. Pancras. The main trains that pass through the tunnels are the Passenger Shuttles (Car and Motorbike), Freight Shuttles (Trucks) and Eurostar (Passengers).

The tunnels were dug by a company called TML (Transmanche Link) using giant tunnelling machines called TBMs (Tunnel Boring Machine). In 1875 British Colonel Frederick E. Beaumont invented a tunnel boring machine. These machines have sharp, spinning blades at the front of the vehicle and they cut away the rock and chalk. The TBMs were built in the tunnel because they were too big and heavy to transport when fully built. The first TBM and its train were 170 metres long. The train carries the debris. The tunnels were being dug toward land and to the sea in both countries. The British had six TBMs and the French had five. This meant that the French had to make one TBM dig two tunnels. They decided to make it dig heading towards the French terminal. When the TBM was digging concrete slabs were put into place to prevent the tunnels from collapsing. TML handed the tunnel project over to Eurotunnel on the 10th of December 1993.

In 1802 the first ideas for a tunnel linking France and Britain were put forward. The idea was a tunnel in which a carriage was pulled by horse. In 1830 Ideas for a rail tunnel under the Channel were proposed. In 1856 an English engineer called William Austin proposed a tunnel similar to the current one with one service tunnel and 2 rail tunnels. In 1880 digs were first started on both sides. Thomé de Gamond had spent around 30 years designing tunnels for this crossing. In 1882 digging was started according to Thomé de Gamond’s plan but the work stopped in 1883 because the British wanted isolation as a defensive principal. In 1955 Britain no longer opposed a fixed link on military grounds. In 1957 the Channel Tunnel Study Group was formed. In 1960 a proposal of two rail tunnels and a service tunnel was put forward. In 1973 the project was started but was called off in 1975 because of financial problems. Ideas for bridges had been suggested with artificial islands in the middle. A submerged tunnel had also been suggested. A floating tunnel was another idea. One person even suggested a sea train. On January 20th 1986 the Eurotunnel proposal was chosen by English Prime minister Margaret Thatcher and French president François Mitterrand.