The entrance shafts were fitted with steam-powered lifts for passengers.

The tunnel was laid

with 2 ft 6 in (762 mm) gauge railway track and a single car, carrying a maximum of 12 passengers,
cable-hauled by two 4-horsepower (3.0 kW) stationary steam engines, one on each side of the river.
The underground railway opened on 2 August 1870[3][5] charging 2d for first class and 1d for second
class, first class ticket holders merely having priority when boarding. [9][page  needed] However, the system
was unreliable and uneconomic, and closed that December after the company went bankrupt.
[3]
 The City and South London Railway (C&SL) was originally designed for cable haulage, like the
Tower Subway, but the unexpected dissolution of the cable contractor (the Patent Cable Tramway
Corporation) precipitated a change to electricity. Its generating power station was built at Stockwell,
and the system employed third-rail electrification. So that the C&SL became, in addition, the first
major railway in the world to use electric traction.[2]