The development of the London underground railway

In the first half of the 1800s, London's population grew at an astonishing rate,
and the central area became increasingly congested. In addition, the expansion
of the overground railway network resulted in more and more passengers
arriving in the capital. However, in 1846, a Royal Commission decided that the
railways should not be allowed to enter the City, the capital's historic and
business centre. The result was that the overground railway stations formed a
ring around the City. The area within consisted of poorly built, overcrowded
slums and the streets were full of horse-drawn traffic. Crossing the City became
a nightmare. It could take an hour and a half to travel 8 km by horse-drawn
carriage or bus. Numerous schemes were proposed to resolve these problems,
but few succeeded.
Amongst the most vocal advocates for a solution to London's traffic problems
was Charles Pearson, who worked as a solicitor for the City of London. He saw
both social and economic advantages in building an underground railway that
would link the overground railway stations together and clear London slums at
the same time. His idea was to relocate the poor workers who lived in the inner-
city slums to newly constructed suburbs, and to provide cheap rail travel for
them to get to work. Pearson's ideas gained support amongst some businessmen
and in 1851 he submitted a plan to Parliament. It was rejected, but coincided
with a proposal from another group for an underground connecting line, which
Parliament passed.
The two groups merged and established the Metropolitan Railway Company
in August 1854. The company's plan was to construct an underground railway
line from the Great Western Railway's (GWR) station at Paddington to the edge
of the City at Farringdon Street - a distance of almost 5 km. The organisation
had difficulty in raising the funding for such a radical and expensive scheme,
not least because of the critical articles printed by the press. Objectors argued
that the tunnels would collapse under the weight of traffic overhead, buildings
would be shaken and passengers would be poisoned by the emissions from the
train engines. However, Pearson and his partners persisted.
The GWR, aware that the new line would finally enable them to run trains into
the heart of the City, invested almost €250,000 in the scheme. Eventually, over
a five-year period, €1 m was raised. The chosen route ran beneath existing main
roads to minimise the expense of demolishing buildings. Originally scheduled
to be completed in 21 months, the construction of the underground line took
three years. It was built just below street level using a technique known as 'cut
and cover'
A trench about ten metres wide and six metres deep was dug, and the sides
temporarily held up with timber beams. Brick walls were then constructed, and
finally a brick arch was added to create a tunnel. A two-metre-deep layer of soil
was laid on top of the tunnel and the road above rebuilt.
The Metropolitan line, which opened on 10 January 1863, was the world's
first underground railway. On its first day, almost 40,000 passengers were
carried between Paddington and Farringdon, the journey taking about 18
minutes. By the end of the Metropolitan's first year of operation, 9.5 million
journeys had been made.
Even as the Metropolitan began operation, the first extensions to the line
were being authorised; these were built over the next five years, reaching
Moorgate in the east of London and Hammersmith in the west. The original
plan was to pull the trains with steam locomotives, using firebricks in the
boilers to provide steam, but these engines were never introduced. Instead, the
line used specially designed locomotives that were fitted with water tanks in
which steam could be condensed. However, smoke and fumes remained a
problem, even though ventilation shafts were added to the tunnels.
Despite the extension of the underground railway, by the 1880s, congestion
on London's streets had become worse. The problem was partly that the existing
underground lines formed a circuit around the centre of London and extended to
the suburbs, but did not cross the capital's centre.
The 'cut and cover' method of construction was not an option in this part of
the capital. The only alternative was to tunnel deep underground.
Although the technology to create these tunnels existed, steam locomotives
could not be used in such a confined space. It wasn't until the development of a
reliable electric motor, and a means of transferring power from the generator to
a moving train, that the world's first deep-level electric railway, the City &
South London, became possible. The line opened in 1890, and ran from the City
to Stockwell, south of the River Thames. The trains were made up of three
carriages and driven by electric engines. The carriages were narrow and had
tiny windows just below the roof because it was thought that passengers would
not want to look out at the tunnel walls. The line was not without its problems,
mainly caused by an unreliable power supply. Although the City & South
London Railway was a great technical achievement, it did not make a profit.
Then, in 1900, the Central London Railway, known as the 'Tuppenny Tube',
began operation using new electric locomotives. It was very popular and soon
afterwards new railways and extensions were added to the growing tube
network. By 1907, the heart of today's Underground system was in place.

● NEW WORDS :
1. congested ( /kənˈdʒes.tɪd/ - adj.) – đông đúc, tắc nghẽn
2. advocate ( /ˈæd.və.keɪt/ - n./v.) – người ủng hộ / ủng hộ
3. solicitor ( /səˈlɪs.ɪ.tər/ - n.) – luật sư
4. submit (/səbˈmɪt/ - v.) – đệ trình, đưa ra
5. funding (/ˈfʌn.dɪŋ/ - n.) – nguồn tài trợ, kinh phí
6. objector ( /əbˈdʒek.tər/ - n.) – người phản đối
7. emission ( /iˈmɪʃ.ən/ - n.) – khí thải
 8. persist (/pəˈsɪst/ - v.) – kiên trì, bền bỉ
9. demolish (/dɪˈmɒl.ɪʃ/ - v.) – phá hủy, dỡ bỏ
10.ventilation (/ˈven.tɪ.leɪt/ - n.) – sự thông gió
11.reliable ( /rɪˈlaɪ.ə.bəl/ - adj.) – đáng tin cậy
12.extension (/ɪkˈsten.ʃən/ - n.) – sự mở rộng
13.locomotive (/ˌləʊ.kəˈməʊ.tɪv/ - n.) – đầu máy xe lửa
14.circuit (/ˈsɜː.kɪt/ - n.) – tuyến đường khép kín
15.radical ( /ˈræd.ɪ.kəl/ - adj.) – triệt để, cấp tiến

● WORD REPORT

Learnt the London Underground rail was "The Development of the London
Underground Railway" was procured from Cambridge IELTS 17, which is a
well-known IELTS preparation book. This section can be found in the Reading
section and it entails the details of the construction and expansion of the London
underground railway system of the past.

The words were chosen from diverse linguistic backgrounds. Words like
"solicitor" (Latin), "advocate" (Latin), and "ventilation" (Old French) have legal
and technical origins. Others such as "funding" and "congested", however, are
from Old English and Germanic sources, therefore, these are the most used old
English/Germanic words in the modern age.

Some words are the most frequent words and are shown many times to
indicate their indispensability. "Extensions" and "submitted" stand for the
development and planning of the railway, meanwhile, "emissions" and
"ventilation" are about environmental issues.

These words are found in an academic and formal register, so they are suitable
not only for writing an essay of infrastructure and urban planning but also for
historical developments. They are the very people who need these kinds of
vocabulary for IELTS exams. Candidates who aim at band 6.5 - 7.5+ will seize
the opportunity to improve their vocabulary for reading and writing tasks.