Forgotten Spiral Escalators of the London Underground Unearthed
Most commuters know the relentless spiral staircases of the London Underground, Covent Garden’s infamous 193-step climb being the ultimate calf-burner. But few realise that the Tube once flirted with something far stranger: spiral escalators.
Unearthing a lost experiment
In 1988, engineers uncovered the rusted remains of a peculiar experiment at the bottom of a disused lift shaft at Holloway Road station. The find wasn’t just old metal. It was the skeleton of an invention that had once promised to revolutionise travel beneath London.
The forgotten escalator was the work of American engineer Jesse Reno. He had already built a demonstration model for the 1902 Earl’s Court Exhibition, an odd spectacle that may have felt closer to a fairground ride than serious infrastructure. His earlier version at Coney Island, New York, had even been steam-powered.
Reno had big plans. He insisted that his spiralling design would feature on the then-new Piccadilly line. At the time, the London Underground hadn’t even installed conventional escalators, straight ones wouldn’t arrive until 1911 at Earl’s Court. Reno, though, was already thinking in curves.
What he built was remarkable: two intertwining spirals around a central core. One carried passengers upwards, the other down. Always clockwise. Always moving. At 100 feet per minute, the ride to street level lasted 45 seconds, about as long as waiting for the next Tube announcement.
Why it never carried a single passenger?
There was, however, a problem. The remains show no safety rails were ever fitted. That alone suggests the escalator was never considered safe enough for public use. In the end, the contraption never carried a single passenger. It was abandoned, left to rust quietly in the dark.
In 1993, London Transport Museum staff salvaged the surviving parts. A restored section now sits proudly at the Museum’s Acton Depot, a gleaming reminder of a bold idea that never quite made it.
The escalator also earned its place on television. It featured in Secrets of the London Underground on UKTV’s Yesterday channel, where historian Tim Dunn and museum curator Siddy Holloway uncovered the story for a new audience.
The spiral that never changed the London travel
Londoners still dash up Covent Garden’s staircase, some turning it into a fitness challenge. But hidden in the capital’s past lies the tale of a wilder alternative—spiral escalators that spun round in circles, dreamed up more than a century ago.
They never changed the way we move under London. But for a brief, forgotten moment, they almost did.
