Subterranean London refers to a number of subterranean structures that lie beneath London. The city has been occupied by humans for two millennia. Over time, the capital has acquired a vast number of these structures and spaces, often as a result of war and conflict.
Dollis Hill is an area in northwest London, which consists of the streets surrounding the 35 hectares Gladstone Park. It is served by a London Underground station, Dollis Hill, on the Jubilee line, providing good links to central London. It is in the London Borough of Brent, close to Willesden Green, Neasden and Cricklewood, and is in the postal districts of NW2 and NW10
Anchor Exchange was an underground, hardened telephone exchange built in Birmingham, England. Construction commenced in 1953 under the guise of building an underground railway. It opened in September 1957 at a cost of £4 million. It was located nominally on Newhall Street. However its network of tunnels extended from at least the Jewellery Quarter to Southside.
Down Street, also known as Down Street (Mayfair), is a disused station on the London Underground, located in Mayfair, west London. The Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway opened it in 1907. It was latterly served by the Piccadilly line and was situated between Dover Street (now named Green Park) and Hyde Park Corner stations.
Kingsway telephone exchange was a Cold War-era hardened telephone exchange underneath High Holborn in London. Initially built as a deep-level air-raid shelter in the early 1940s, it was instead used as a government communications centre. In 1949 the General Post Office (GPO) took over the building, and in 1956 it became the UK termination point for TAT-1, the first transatlantic telephone cable. Closure of the facility began in the 1980s. It was built together with underground exchanges in Birmingham and Manchester, and was originally covered by a D notice
A number of military citadels are known to have been constructed underground in central London, dating mostly from the Second World War and the Cold War. Unlike traditional above-ground citadels, these sites are primarily secure centres for defence coordination.
The Marsham Towers were three towers at the corner of Marsham Street and Great Peter Street in Westminster, London. They served as the headquarters of the Department of the Environment.
ROTOR was an elaborate air defence radar system built by the British Government in the early 1950s to counter possible attack by Soviet bombers. To get it operational as quickly as possible, it was initially made up primarily of WWII-era systems, notably the original Chain Home radars for the early warning role, and the AMES Type 7 for plotting and interception control. Data from these stations was sent to a network of control stations, mostly built underground, using an extensive telephone and telex network.
RAF Daws Hill was a Ministry of Defence site, located near High Wycombe and Flackwell Heath, in Buckinghamshire, England, close to the M40 motorway.
The Churchill War Rooms is a museum in London and one of the five branches of the Imperial War Museum. The museum comprises the Cabinet War Rooms, a historic underground complex that housed a British government command centre throughout the Second World War, and the Churchill Museum, a biographical museum exploring the life of British statesman Winston Churchill.
North End is a never-completed underground station, on the Charing Cross, Euston and Hampstead Railway. The station was to have been built at North End on the boundaries of Hampstead Heath and Golders Hill Park and is located on the Edgware branch between Hampstead and Golders Green.
The Post Office Research Station was first established as a separate section of the General Post Office in 1909.
The Hack Green Secret Nuclear Bunker is a former government-owned nuclear bunker located at Hack Green, Cheshire, England.
Regional seats of government or RSGs were the best known aspect of Britain's civil defence preparations against nuclear war. In fact, however, naming conventions changed over the years as strategies in Whitehall changed.
The Kelvedon Hatch Secret Nuclear Bunker at Kelvedon Hatch, in the Borough of Brentwood in the English county of Essex, is a large underground bunker maintained during the Cold War as a potential regional government headquarters. Since being decommissioned in 1992, the bunker has been open to the public as a tourist attraction, with a museum focusing on its Cold War history.
Oxgate Admiralty Citadel is the name given to a military bunker constructed between 1937 and 1940, for the Admiralty, on the corner of Edgware Road and Oxgate Lane, in north London.
HMS Badger was a shore establishment of the Royal Navy on the east coast of the United Kingdom. She was commissioned on 13 September 1939 was the flagship of the headquarters of the Flag Officer in Charge (FOIC), Harwich who was responsible to Commander-in-Chief, The Nore, and was decommissioned on 21 October 1946, although the Operations Room remained as the Emergency Port Control for the Harwich area. The site was Parkeston Quay, now Harwich International Port, and the bunker lies under Hamilton House, currently an occupational health centre, close to the entrance to Harwich International Port, a few miles west of Harwich.
RAF Sopley was a World War II station, codenamed Starlight, near the village of Sopley in Hampshire. The Radar Station was opened in December 1940. In 1959 it became an air traffic control radar station, and finally closed on 27 September 1974. Nearby Sopley Camp was built in the early 1950s as a domestic site for the radar station and is probably best known as the initial home of the Vietnamese Boat People, in 1979. The camp was sold in 1993 to a local partnership under the name Merryfield Park. Most of the old barracks site had been redeveloped as housing, but the 2-storey building at the Sopley end has been converted into a museum/education centre by Friends Of New Forest Airfields (FONFA). The museum opened in May 2016.
Royal Air Force Holmpton or more simply RAF Holmpton is a former Royal Air Force Cold War era nuclear bunker that was built in the 1950s as an early warning radar station as part of the ROTOR Radar Defence Programme. Located just south of the village of Holmpton, in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England, RAF Holmpton remained a part of the Defence Estate right up to 8 December 2014 when it was sold into private ownership after 62 years of military service.
Royal Air Force Portland or more simply RAF Portland is a former Royal Air Force and ROTOR radar station on the Isle of Portland, Dorset, England. Located close to the Verne Citadel and East Cliff, the station was established in the 1950s as part of a nationwide air defence radar system built by the British Government during the Cold War. The station became a scheduled monument in 2004 and is now the site of the community farm, Fancy's Family Farm.
