--- title: Tunnels and what lies under the street — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Tunnels and what lies under the street», a lesson of the technology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: Under the street you walk on there is a hidden city: water pipes, sewers, gas pipes, electricity and internet cables, and someti --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Technology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/) / Tunnels and what lies under the street # Tunnels and what lies under the street Lesson 29 of the technology course of Mova's primary school: 17 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/0/) — Under the street you walk on there is a hidden city: water pipes, sewers, gas pipes, electricity and internet cables, and sometimes whole railway tunnels. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/2/) — The coloured paint marks that workers spray on the pavement before roadworks are a map of that hidden city, showing where pipes and cables run, so the diggers do not hit them. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/3/) — Big tunnels today are dug by tunnel-boring machines, giant metal worms with a spinning cutting wheel at the front. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/4/) — As the machine creeps forward, it fits curved concrete pieces into rings behind it, so the tunnel is lined like a pipe as it goes. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/5/) — Long ago tunnels were dug by hand with picks, shovels and gunpowder by the light of candles and lamps. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/6/) — Old mines and tunnels are still dangerous: they can collapse or be full of bad air, so nobody goes into them for fun. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/7/) — A tunnel-boring machine grinds through rock or soil with a giant rotating cutting wheel and lines the tunnel with concrete rings behind it; lasers and measurements guide it the right way. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/8/) — Tunnel-boring machines are often given women's names, from an old tradition linked to Saint Barbara, the saint of miners. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/9/) — The Channel Tunnel joins England and France under the sea with three tunnels, two for trains and one service tunnel between them; it is about 50 km long, opened in 1994, is nicknamed the Chunnel, and its trains are electric. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/10/) — Big fans push fresh air through road and rail tunnels and clear smoke if there is a fire, and long tunnels have emergency exits and safe rooms. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/11/) — Mines are shafts and tunnels dug for coal, metals or salt; some gold mines in South Africa go more than 3 km deep. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/12/) — Never go into old mines, caves or tunnels; they can collapse or be full of bad air. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/13/) — Under every street run water pipes, sewers, gas pipes and electricity and internet cables; workers spray coloured paint to mark them, and diggers check for cables before digging. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/14/) — Sewers are big underground tunnels that carry dirty water and rain to treatment works; London's main sewers were built in the 1860s by Joseph Bazalgette and helped end the city's outbreaks of cholera, a deadly illness spread by dirty water. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/15/) — Road tunnels have lights, fans, cameras, emergency phones and radio for warnings; the lights are brighter at the entrance so drivers' eyes can get used to the dark. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/16/) — Before machines, tunnels were dug by hand with picks, shovels and explosives by the light of candles or lamps; the first tunnel under the River Thames opened in 1843. - [18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/29-tunnels-and-under-the-street/18/) — Tunnel lining is made of big curved concrete pieces fitted together into rings, like a pipe; the rings hold back the rock and soil so the tunnel does not collapse. - ← previous: [Diggers, cranes and cement mixers](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/28-diggers-cranes-and-cement-mixers/) - next →: [Bridges and skyscrapers](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/30-bridges-and-skyscrapers/) - ↑ back to [Technology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/technology/)