Monument record TR 36 NE 2742 - Ramsgate public air raid shelter

The site of Ramsgate public air raid shelter located at TR 387 650. It was built during the Second World War at the southern portal of the railway tunnel on Marina Esplanade. The tunnel was part of Pleasureland Entertainment Park, which built a scenic railway running from the southern portal tunnel to a new terminus at Hereson Road in 1936. The railway closed at the outbreak of war in 1939 and was incorporated into a network of tunnels and deep air raid shelters excavated into the chalkstone at Ramsgate. The tunnels ran 3.25 miles around the town in a semi-circular route at a depth of 50 to 90 feet. The tunnels were mostly unlined, but entrances were lined with reinforced concrete. The tunnel network was designed to hold 60,000 people (35,000 seated). There was an entrance to the air raid shelters at both ends of the railway tunnel, at Hereson Road Station, and three further entrances on the east wall of the tunnel, one serving the synagogue and Dumpton Park Drive, one at Marina Esplanade and one at Victoria Parade. The majority of the entrances were sealed shut after the war and the railway continued to operate from 1946 until 1957, when the tunnel portal was rebuilt. It then continued to operate until its closure in 1965. The north and south entrances to the railway tunnel have been blocked. Below ground however, the network of tunnels remain largely intact. (1)

<1> Peter Higginbotham, Higginbotham, Peter. 2000. The Workhouse. (Website). SKE53741.