Having recently moved to Greenwich and still getting to know the area I thought it was time I walked through the Greenwich Foot Tunnel and take a few photographs in the process. I had previously walked through the tunnel many years ago and one of my main recollections was constantly trying to avoid cyclists racing through it, despite the many 'no cycling' signs within and outside the tunnel. Time to see if things had changed. 

The Greenwich Foot Tunnel was opened in 1902 and runs between Greenwich (just by the Cutty Sark Ship) on the south side of the River Thames all the way to Island Gardens on the Isle of Dogs on the north side of the river. The tunnel enabled dock workers living south of the river to reach their ship yards on the other side. It replaced an unreliable ferry service which was initially used instead.

I thought my best bet was to set off early to avoid the crowds (Greenwich seems to get busier by the week at the moment) so I set off for my ‘daily exercise’ along the River Thames at 7am heading west past the Cutty Sark public house and then past Greenwich Power station as it loomed over me looking rather eerie. It’s February so the dark winter mornings seem to be a thing of the past for now and it felt like spring was on its way. 

I continued along the Thames Path towards the Trafalgar Tavern pub and then through Greenwich Naval College. Walking this route is always a pleasure, the college has so much history and if you time it right you may see some A list celebrities due to it being a popular filming location. I came out at the Cutty Sark (the real thing this time, not the pub) and then turned right towards the foot tunnel entrance. It’s a traditional attractive red brick building with a glazed roof forming a curve before the London skyline. I took a few snaps before proceeding through the tunnel entrance.

You have the option to take the stairs or the lift to the tunnel down below, I chose the former due to my slight phobia of the latter, however you may take the lift should you have a bicycle, pushchair, or confined to a wheelchair. It was still early, around 7:15am so there were very few people around. The tunnel is open 24 hours a day, though I wouldn’t fancy doing the walk during the middle of the night, however be reassured it’s very well lit throughout. I started to walk down the steps and kept to the left to get more of a firm footing on the wider steps due to their spiral formation, there are 100 steps in all on the south side of the river descending down 50 feet to the tunnel level. That may sound intimidating, but the steps are gradual and I never felt like I would lose my footing. As I reached the bottom I was greeted by the long narrow tunnel in front of me. The curved wall is tiled in white and the floor is formed of concrete paving stones with a very faded white line dividing the two directions of travel.

I began walking the Greenwich Foot Tunnel then after a few steps I stopped to take my camera out of my bag (the Fuji X-T3) and began to think about compositions. My main goal was to take some sharp moody photographs, but also create a small depth of field. I also brought the 35mm 1.4 lens to try and achieve this look. I was conscious about the lack of light despite the tunnel being lit fairly well with strips of light along the tunnel ceiling, therefore a wide aperture would be required, especially if the shutter speed was high due to moving subjects. I took around twenty photographs in total with mixed results. Many were under exposed due to me trying to push the aperture narrower than f2, I tried to add some exposure compensation, but clearly not enough in some cases. I also experimented with manual focus due to the low light though this was tricky with fast moving cyclists. These are the photographs I was most happy with, but still some room for improvement. There were minimal changes in Lightroom, I added my usual base changes such as exposure, contrast, highlights, shadows etc. and a slight S on the tone curve. Apart from that a bit of noise reduction is places.

I continued to walk down the 1215 ft long tunnel down the slight decline towards the halfway mark. It was becoming apparent already that the no cycling rule appears to come across as a polite request rather than an instruction for a few people and is exacerbated even more so due to the speed they gathered downwards as they raced past me. I kept my composure even if I was tempted to ‘accidentally’ move into their path. Also, the tunnel was fairly quiet due to the time of day so it wasn’t a major concern. So much so that it did feel very eerie for a short period as I couldn’t see anybody else in either direction! As I continued to walk past the halfway mark there was now an incline heading back up towards the north side. Along the ground of the tunnel were patches of water which was slightly disconcerting, I hoped a leak wasn’t imminent! There were still very few pedestrians at this stage, there was the odd cyclist racing down the tunnel. At least with it being quiet I could hear them coming so had plenty of warning to get out of the way. I tended to crouch down in the centre of the pathway while taking photographs to get closer to ground level, but I was mindful to move when I heard the sounds of wheels turning in the distance. As I approached the exit on the other side, the tunnel began to narrow as it appeared more strengthened by thick iron segments, similar to what you see in the London Underground as you can see in these images.

I headed straight for the staircase and made my way up towards the surface, however the lift was out of action on the north side which meant cyclists were coming down the steps towards me when I was going up, something to be mindful of to avoid getting a front wheel shoved in your face! Also, the climb up was slightly more awkward than on the way down as I was now on the inside of the spiral with less of a footing, however it wasn’t too treacherous, but still a relief to be up on ground level into the fresh air. I was greeted by a small green park area called Island Gardens which was very pleasant. I then turned around to face the tunnel entrance to take in the views of Greenwich from the north side of the river. There was a bit of cloud coverage by this point so these photographs of Greenwich Naval College and Island Gardens didn’t come out quite as punchy as I’d hoped.

I took a short walk down the Thames path heading east and realised that it’s not a path I’ve walked before and I was pleasantly surprised by the views. If I’d have carried on it would have taken me around the south eastern curve of the Isle of Dogs and although it’s somewhere I would have liked to explore further, I decided to save it for another day and headed back towards the north tunnel entrance and back through to the other side. I took a few snaps on the way back and finished with this one of the south side lift.

I was quite pleased how this photo came out especially as the ISO was fairly high (I have the camera limited to a maximum of 6400), although you can spot a bit of noise due to the aperture going up to f8.

All in all I was quite pleased with my trip through walking through the Greenwich Foot Tunnel and pleasantly surprised how most of the photographs came out. However, I was disappointed that even though I took the 35mm 1.4 lens, the widest aperture I went to was f2. I think I was conscious not to compromise too much on sharpness, however I’d like to try this exercise again trying only shots on a 1.4 aperture. I’d also like to go when it’s slightly busier to capture a few more characters that aren’t joggers or cyclists.

Thank you for reading and you can see more images from my London adventures here