Liverpudlians have begun to excavate the tunnels of Joseph Williamson, a local 19th-Cen tycoon who hired thousands of men to honeycomb the city with labyrnthine tunnels that dead-end, circle back and stack atop one another (think of a subterranean Winchester Mystery House). It's unclear whether he did this because he was nuts, or because he wanted to give the laboring classes "productive" labor, or because he was remotely controlled by the Mole People (my pet theory).
"We still don't know where each one leads, and we are finding new tunnels all the time," she says.
"There is a triple-decker tunnel under the carpark here and a completely different section has just been found up the road."
Back within the barrel-shaped chamber, the tunnel twists, turns, narrows and changes level.
Smaller tunnels and chimneys head off into the darkness.
Mapping the maze has not been easy. Williamson was notoriously secretive about his creation and no contemporary plan of the whole network survives.
(Thanks, Kurt!)
