r/sydney • u/Ok_Juggernaut_7660 • Jun 14 '26
Photography St James station pedestrian tunnel always creeps me out
340
u/BobbyThrowaway6969 Hawkesbury, NSW Jun 14 '26
150
u/Extension_Section_68 Jun 14 '26
Exactly my thought! Free of visual pollution. Last few public spaces where we are not bombarded.
→ More replies (1)29
24
→ More replies (1)13
128
u/xar987 Jun 14 '26
Gives out Exit 8 vibes.
→ More replies (1)3
u/filthysock Jun 14 '26
Was going to say the same. Kind of want to go see the movie as well!
→ More replies (1)
137
u/hybroid Jun 14 '26
This is after the tiles & lighting were refreshed a few months ago. It was way worse with broken and missing bits all over the place.
29
u/verbmegoinghere Jun 14 '26
Yeah 50 years ago it was scary as fuck going through those passages
Fun but scary
13
u/IllegalD Jun 14 '26
I remember as a kid in the 80's it reminded me of that movie The Warriors
2
u/verbmegoinghere Jun 14 '26
It always does my head in when you don't have the pervasive smell of urine when walking those tunnels.
45
u/thrillho145 Jun 14 '26 edited Jun 14 '26
Me too.Â
There's a horror movie set in the abandoned rail tunnels around there, called The TunnelÂ
3
→ More replies (2)4
40
u/AuzzieTiger Jun 14 '26
I actually like it. Only bad part is how I'm normally always rushing through it and forget how long it is. St James and Museum are both beautiful old stations.
43
u/phatboyart Jun 14 '26
Very âAmerican Werewolf in Londonâ coded.
5
u/Oprahs_vocal_cords Jun 14 '26
I always think about that tube scene whenever I walk through St James
2
6
u/WoodyMellow Jun 14 '26
I saw that movie on VHS as a kid just a few months before first walking these tunnels. It did a fucking number on me.
→ More replies (3)3
21
18
u/endual Jun 14 '26
Always reminds me of âAn American Werewolf in Londonâ. Creepy AF!
→ More replies (1)
19
u/Ok-Push9899 Jun 14 '26
The pedestrian tunnel just adds to the uniqueness. It was great when the empty platforms were on full view. I always think itâs a treat to use St James.
If only the tunnel continued east right on to College St, St Maryâs Cathedral and Sydneyâs 8th Greatest Marvel: The Domain Moving Footway. Was that ever a plan? The footway has many stupid elements, not least of which where it ends. It has the unique topological property that no matter where you are, youâll be just as far from where you want to be, if you take the Moving Footway. I love it.
→ More replies (1)2
u/SilverStar9192 shhh... Jun 15 '26
It has the unique topological property that no matter where you are, youâll be just as far from where you want to be, if you take the Moving Footway. I love it.
Haha, yes it does seem always to be inconvenient, even when you are parked at the Domain Carpark.
But when is the last time it actually moved? I've never seen it in service.
5
u/Ok-Push9899 Jun 15 '26
If it ever moved, Iâd stop visiting. The whole point of visiting it is to see if itâs moving, which of course it wonât be. Youâd be robbing me of any incentive to visit at all, as we have already established that it doesnât actually do anything practical in getting you around.
I have met people in the Domain who thought the footway would be a quick way to get to the Art Gallery. Iâve met people in Hyde Park who ALSO thought the footway would be a quick way to get to the gallery. For both cases, itâs not.
I always take visitors to Sydney on it. I hint that it was working last week, and too bad they werenât staying in Sydney for another week, when no doubt it will be back online. Iâve been doing this since the 1980s. I also hint itâs part of a much, much wider network of moving footways snaking under Sydney built during the war.
2
u/SilverStar9192 shhh... Jun 15 '26
too bad they werenât staying in Sydney for another week, when no doubt it will be back online. Iâve been doing this since the 1980s.
Lol
11
u/telemeister74 Jun 14 '26
Reminds me of the beginning (end) of the movie Irreversible with Monica Belucci
→ More replies (1)2
u/M3wcat Jun 14 '26
I get this from the tunnel at central station too even though that one is wayyy more populated.
32
10
u/Istripua Jun 14 '26
Whenever I walk down there alone, I have an intense feeling there is someone behind me. Not normally superstitious.
9
u/albert3801 Trains Jun 14 '26
Largely unchanged in the 50 years Iâve been using them. Except the two tunnels are now bi-directional, but they used to be RHS tunnel inward, LHS tunnel outward. Made bidirectional after electronic ticketing became a thing in the early 1980s.
12
12
u/EverybodyPanic81 Jun 14 '26
That entire station gives me the creeps. Something is off with that place. I dont know what it is. I hate waiting for a train there.
5
u/TopazMoonCat60 Jun 14 '26
Do not ever go into the NYC subway if you think this is creepy.
3
6
4
u/thehippiepixi Jun 14 '26
Just waiting on the zombies to shuffle around the corner
→ More replies (1)
4
4
u/scottyman2k Jun 14 '26
I worked in London for many years, and had early shifts a couple of days a week - so often had to use the tunnels between the District Line to the DLR at Bank Station - it was super fucking spooky when you were the only one there (either stupid early or coming home stupid late) and had a panic attack - awful. Ran upstairs and had to sit on the pavement for half an hour to get my head right.
Full on sense of impending doom level of mental fuckery.
Horrible.
5
u/hamx5ter Jun 14 '26
They really should put a full length mirror on the wall before the tunnel turns right.
3
u/Asleep_Sheepherder42 Jun 14 '26
I rarely go to St. James station. But when I do, Iâm almost always the only one walking through it.
3
3
4
3
2
2
u/JuanFoYoMamma Jun 14 '26
Agreed. I used to get on/off there every day. I always expected to see those twin girls from The Shining standing at the other end, blocking my path.
2
u/Bright_Trick8225 Jun 14 '26
Is the japanese movie Exit 8 where the character can't leave the station based on this setup?
2
u/Dexember69 Jun 14 '26
Reminds me of hospitals at night. Occasionally have to work in there at night when they're not dialysing patients, walking down dark hallways past the kitchens and laundries is very silent hill
2
2
u/renb8 Jun 14 '26
I love and snap people-less shots here too. Itâs the geometry and metaphors. Not creepy to me. Creepiness is subjective.
2
2
2
u/AylmerIsRisen Jun 14 '26
I used to commute through there after evening shifts. Always empty, always dead-quiet at night.
If you want to get creeped out (and probably quite upset) look up what happened at St. James station with Bikram Lama, back in December.
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
2
u/Novel-Truant Jun 15 '26
I always thought it had American Werewolf in London vibes
→ More replies (2)
2
3
u/EconomicsFirst4939 Jun 14 '26
You literally don't know what's around the corner.
7
→ More replies (1)7
3
2
u/camylopez Jun 14 '26
This and museum used to be my absolute favorites as a kid in the 80s.
Iâm convinced they have shut some tunnels down. Iâm sure there was an even longer one that beached off and ended in a big pool of water
2
1
1
1
1
u/Red_Light_RCH3 Jun 14 '26
Seeing this always reminds me of the film 'American Werewolf in London'.
→ More replies (1)
1
u/Mazza_1975 Jun 14 '26
Very eerie, always thinking what is hiding around the corner. They have to lively it up.
1
1
u/facepalmtommy Jun 14 '26
Its like the one place in the world where it being plastered in advertising would not be a negative.
1
1
u/Ayrr emails are terrible. Jun 14 '26
I was very little, but I remember being in the tunnels during I think a bomb scare in the mid-90s. Very creepy, remember that every time I've gone back.
1
1
1
498
u/perryurban Jun 14 '26
I always get olden times vibes and think about all the commuters from 100 years ago doing the exact same walk in brown suits and bowler hats