Liverpool region tunnel is a 'Bourne Identity' mystery

An railway tunnel, which is the subject of a "Bourne Identity" puzzle over the name of its designer, has been granted listed building status.

The Bourne Tunnel is part of the engineering on the Liverpool to Manchester line and one of the earliest examples of its kind from the railway age.

It was built, ear Rainhill, the late 1820s and runs for 104ft to pass under the Liverpool and Manchester line, the first locomotive passenger line in the world.

The tunnell was built to accommodate a colliery tramway which linked a pit Sutton with a with a weighing machine and coal stockpile on the Liverpool-Warrington turnpike road.

The Bourne Tunnel has been given Grade II listed status for architectural as well as historical reasons. Engineering skill is evident in its angled design and attention to aesthetic detail.

It also forms part of a significant group of railway structures on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway Line. They include the Grade II listed Skew Bridge at Rainhill (1828-9), Ropers Bridge at Knowsley (c. 1829), four other railway bridges at Huyton with Roby (c. 1829) and Rainhill Station (1860-68).

It is not known exactly who designed the Bourne Tunnel, but it’s believed that many of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway Line’s bridges were designed by George Stephenson’s apprentice, Thomas L Gooch, with the help of Liverpool dock engineer Jesse Hartley.

The Sutton collieries were later connected to the St Helens and Runcorn Gap Railway – which became operational from 1833 - rendering the tramway and turnpike road increasingly obsolete.

John, James and Peter Bourne, the Liverpool brothers who originally leased the land in Rainhill, and their partner, Sutton coal proprietor Robert Robinson, surrendered their lease in 1844 and the tramway was dismantled.

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