Great Victorian Way
Unbuilt London infrastructure project / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The Great Victorian Way was an unbuilt infrastructure project, plans for which were presented to the Parliamentary Select Committee on Metropolitan Communications by its designer Joseph Paxton in June 1855. It would have consisted of a ten-mile covered loop around much of central and west London, integrating a glass-roofed street, railways, shops and houses. Three river crossings – two on the main loop and one on a branch – would have continued the arcade, creating inhabited bridges. The structure was closely modelled on Paxton's own Crystal Palace.
The proposal was sympathetically received by the committee, and also endorsed by Prince Albert prior to the passing of an act of Parliament authorising its construction, but ultimately abandoned on grounds of cost[1] when the Great Stink of 1858 caused all London's infrastructure attention and funds to be devoted to the creation of a functioning sewer network system designed by Sir Joseph Bazalgette.
The later, less ambitious Circle line roughly followed the route of The Great Victorian Way and produced some of its transport benefits.