Gibraltar Tube?

In inaugurating the new port at Barcelona, which cost more than 100,000,000 pesetas ($19,300,000), King Alfonso urged the study of a tube to Africa under the Strait of Gibraltar-- a distance of about twelve miles.

This project, like its sister scheme of a Franco-English tunnel under the Channel, has long been mooted. According to U. S. engineers, it would be "child's play" to build it, owing chiefly to favorable submarine conditions, cheap electrical power for boring and a plentiful supply of skilled labor.

According to King Alfonso, the proposed tunnel would cost around 250,000,000 pesetas ($48,250,000), which he declared to be a small amount compared to the advantages that Spain would reap from a commercial undersea road to Africa.

Spanish, British and French capitalists were said to be willing to supply the necessary capital.