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Where is the world's longest publicly accessible purpose-built pedestrian tunnel?

Wikipedia has:

Where is the longest purpose-built pedestrian tunnel in the world? By a pedestrian tunnel, I mean a tunnel that, when built, was not designed for anything larger than a pedestrian or possibly cyclists. For example, the Niwärch tunnel counts; built for water + human but has always been publicly accessible, but does not fit anything larger than a pedestrian (the watercourse is less than a metre wide). Disused railways that are now open to foot and bike traffic don't count. For the purpose of my question, it should be a simple tunnel connecting A to B; large networks of underground pathways such as the Toronto PATH do not count, for the same reason that the Shanghai Metro does not count as the world's longest railway tunnel.

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    You could edit the wikipedia entry to add the Niwärch tunnel.
    – Max
    Mar 23, 2017 at 19:34
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    @gerrit you might like to know tripadvisor.pt/… Probably not on list of longest, since it's only 500mts but very, very intersting pedestrian tunnel. It's in antwerp and goes under the river. It's accessible through wooden automatic stairs. Very nice.
    – nsn
    Mar 23, 2017 at 20:08
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    @gerrit I agree with you about Standedge, but perhaps more interesting is that, lacking a towpath like most other canal tunnels, it was designed for the source of motive power to be human legs - so nearly pedestrian, and yet so definitely not!
    – MadHatter
    Mar 24, 2017 at 6:58
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    Are you including those built in city subway systems? Toronto's PATH underground passenger system is about 30 km long, although it also added elevated and at grade walkways.
    – Giorgio
    Mar 26, 2017 at 16:33
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    Perhaps not what you're after, and maybe doesn't qualify due to being a 'network', but the 121-km long Củ Chi tunnel network is worth noting. Since the criteria is continuous length, you'd have to work out what the longest continuous stretch in there is.
    – daamsie
    Apr 5, 2017 at 11:28

4 Answers 4

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Your conditions are quite strict - "Longest", "publicly accessible", AND "purpose-built". A "simple tunnel connecting A to B".

There is indeed a tunnel that meets these criteria that at 1,635 metres is slightly longer than the one you've mentioned. The tunnel itself IS publicly accessible, although at the current time it's entire length is not accessible - only part of it.

For this "simple tunnel", point A is North Korea. Point B is South Korea. And the tunnel is commonly known as the 'Third Infiltration Tunnel'. It was built to allow "pedestrians" (in the form of North Korean soldiers) to travel from North Korea into South Korea. The southern end of the tunnel is currently open to the public (with restrictions around nationalities that can visit, but still...) and you can travel some way into the tunnel below the DMZ between the two countries.

Two additional, much longer tunnels in the same area meet all of your criteria except for not being publicly accessible. The first and second Infiltration Tunnels are both around 3.5km long and were purpose-built for "pedestrians". The forth Infiltration Tunnel rounds out the set, but is only around 2km long.

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    I'm amazed that ANY parts of those infiltration tunnels are accessible.
    – Mark Mayo
    Apr 8, 2017 at 3:08
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    Great find! The reasons to build a tunnel just for pedestrians scarce but war is probably one of them!
    – Itai
    Apr 8, 2017 at 3:17
  • It's funny they actually have a fourth tunnel as well! Granted not as long as the other three.
    – kiradotee
    Aug 26, 2020 at 10:52
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The pedestrian-part of the Galleria ENEL Alpe Croppi di Lago appears to be around 2.8 km long (and reportedly only around 1.8 metre high in places, though I'm not sure about the height in general). It is used by a variant route of the GTA and other hiking routes. It is described by this video on youtube.

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  • I can confirm that this one appears to tick all the boxes in the question. Source: I went through it a few years ago.
    – Some wandering yeti
    Aug 26, 2020 at 18:16
  • @Somewanderingyeti Is it really only around 1.8 metre high throughout? That would make passing through for me rather uncomfortable, even moreso if I'm wearing my ridiculously large backpack. I can bend occasionally but walking bent for more than half an hour, with a heavy backpack, could be quite unpleasant.
    – gerrit
    Aug 27, 2020 at 5:50
  • It will be a higher throughout. I'm a few centimeters short of 1.8m and could pass without worrying about bumping into anything. Don't worry unless you happen to be sumo-sized.
    – Some wandering yeti
    Aug 27, 2020 at 9:38
  • @Somewanderingyeti Good to hear I don't need to bring a helmet to cross this tunnel!
    – gerrit
    Aug 28, 2020 at 7:12
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There's a pedestrian tunnel under construction under Løvstakken, in Bergen, Norway. The length is 2900m. It's scheduled to open in 2023.

Parallelt med traseen bygges det en gang- og sykkeltunnel. Tunnelen vil bli en toveis bane med en bredde på seks meter. 3,5 meter blir sykkelfelt og 2,5 meter blir fortau.

In paralell with the [light rail] tunnel, a separate pedestrian and biking tunnel is being built. The tunnel will have two lanes [for bikes and pedestrians], with a total width of 6 meters. 3.5 meters will be bike lanes, and 2.5 meters for pedestrians.

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Tunnel de la Croix-Rousse in Lyon, France, is a pair of tunnels, the first one for cars, the other one for sustainable transport (pedestrians, cyclists, busses). Their length is 1782m.

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    The buses make it ineligible, by the OP's criteria ("not designed for anything larger than a pedestrian or possibly cyclists").
    – MadHatter
    Jul 24, 2018 at 9:22

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