Canada Dock Tunnel

The Canada Dock tunnel opened on the 15th October 1866, it was built to enable trains to go under the Liverpool and Leeds canal to access the new Bootle station that was renamed Canada Dock in 1881, which was a passenger and goods station but closed to passangers on 4th May 1941, the tunnel was 427 yards long and was 2 tracks wide, it became disused on 12th December 1982 and the tracks lifted shortly after and left disused until 1992, when the whole station site which was in a cutting and the tunnel portal was filled in. Untill 1881 the tunnel was much longer before the Atlantic Dock Junction was built, and a vent can still be seen at Kirkdale station the other 3 vents where demolised when the tunnel was opened up into cuttings, the original tunnel ran from Canada Dock station to County Road near Spellow station.



The tunnel today is still there and you can still access it from the atlantic junction side that is not blocked but very overgrown, the other end of the tunnel is flooded and you can see the mound of dirt when the tunnel was filled in from the canada dock side.

 

The tunnel was safeguarded for future rail use from 1982 till 2015.



Stations Along Canada Dock Tunnel Branch

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