06/09/2026
Living in Dorset, I fairly often use this road “tunnel,” as I did again today.
It’s the perfect place if you want to hear what your V8 sounds like, test how good your horn is, discover exactly where your Honda rev limiter kicks in… or, less excitingly, simply travel north to south through West Dorset. 😂
Anyway, I digress.
Being the only road tunnel in the county — or so I thought — it got me wondering: at what point does a bridge actually become a tunnel?
Apparently, in the UK, the benchmark is 150 metres.
Being slightly dull, I naturally looked this up. I then immediately searched the length of the Beaminster Tunnel and discovered it is only 105 metres.
That’s a whole 45 metres short, which is, scientifically speaking, quite a lot of bananas. 🍌
Everyone I know calls it a tunnel. Even the internet seems perfectly happy calling it a tunnel. But now I know the truth, what am I supposed to do when somebody mentions it?
Do I politely go along with it… or become that person who says, “Actually, technically…”? 😅
And more importantly, what am I supposed to call the “Beaminster Tunnel” now?
I feel genuinely let down to discover that Dorset may not have a proper road tunnel at all. 😂