24hr Project - A Portrait of Plymouth - The Darkies Tunnels

For my degree, we were given an assignment that would direct us, and give us a feel of the pressure and time constraints of Press Photography. We were asked to make our own way to Plymouth from Falmouth, shoot, edit and upload our projects before the midnight deadline. The brief was that we had to show a different side to Plymouth, and not just your usual walk around the street and take pictures of buildings. This meant we had to do prior research (about 5 days to do the research) and go there with idea's, shoots and contacts in mind.

I decided to shoot some disused railway tunnels that was a truly hidden side to Plymouth due to the limited number of people with knowledge of their existence. The tunnels themselves had been stripped of railway and abandoned since the 1980's, disused for quite some time previously. What I hadn't gathered on, is that the council had recently boarded up all entrances to these tunnels due to pesky troublemakers using the tunnels as a place to congregate, drink, cause litter etc. This meant my plans immediately had to change, I learned from one of the locals in the area that the last remaining access to the tunnels was beneath the City College. I was dispirited at hearing this, as college's are notorious for not letting people on to site without prior arrangement due to health and saftey and background checks. I thought I might as well try my luck and after talking to the receptionist, and then to one of the security / caretakers I managed to convince them to take me down there. Although I could not explore as far as I would of liked, I managed to achieve everything I set out to do and my day, the people I met and talked to was a photo story in itself.

Although I am not hugely proud of the set of images I produced, the fact that I set out and completed my intentions, overcoming obstacles and gaining access that I've always struggled with, worked within a time constraint and approached Plymouth with a single idea and managed to expand that into a photo story made me hugely proud of my work. Here are the results.

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'American Bobby', 36 from Tennessee, who has lived in Devonport for 5 years working for Chris & Robs Barbers had detailed knowledge of the locations of the tunnels.

The tunnels lie underneath Devenport park, an area that has been neglected in it's upkeep. Because of this The tunnel entrances have been boarded up by the council to prevent further damage and grafitti.

The Last remaining entrance is underneath the City College of Plymouth. The Security guard, From Devonport is the current keyholder to the last access to the tunnels.

The Railway line was used in the Napoleon Wars up till the end of the First World war to help deal with casulties and transport of goods.

There is the question of what will happen to 'The Darkies' as vast underground spaces continue to go unused with the majority of the inhabitants of Plymouth unaware of it's exsistance.

The tunnels have laid derelict and stripped of the railways since the 1980's, Untill boarded up the tunnels were used as a place for social gathering and eriee nights.

Darkies Tunnels, two disused railway tunnels that used to make up part of the London and South western Railway, constructed in the late 1800's. The track passes underground from Albert Road halt through Devonport park to Devonport Kings Road station, now the site of City college of Plymouth for 485 metres