Lying just below the surface of Manchester sits a complex network of underground tunnels.

Several kilometres of subterranean passageways and spaces stretch under large parts of the city centre and beyond.

These tunnels include the remnants of a tube station that never was, a communications bunker, air raid shelters, canals and even shops.

Author Keith Warrender has written two books on the subject, Underground Manchester and Below Manchester, and regularly gives talks on what is below the surface of Manchester.

Keith, who took the took the above pictures during his various trips below ground, said there is evidence of tunnels being used below the city for several hundred years.

(Image: Keith Warrender) (Image: Keith Warrender)

He added: "It was something that interested me and I began to research the subject and started to do talks on it. People then shared their own things with me and it all came from there.

"The tunnels range from a long period of time.

"Some go back to the times of the religious persecution where people of the Catholic faith had routes in and out of the city. That is one of the earliest ones.

"Then we got to the Victorian period when that is when there was the big flood of underground projects."

Some of these projects include the Victoria Arches which was a structure built into the embankment of the River Irwell. The shops, accessible from street level via wooden staircases closed in the 1930s and the space was used as an air raid shelter in World War Two.

There are also underground river and canal tunnels such as the Manchester and Salford Junction Canal Tunnel underneath the Great Northern which joins the Rochdale Canal and River Irwell.

(Image: Keith Warrender)

(Image: Keith Warrender)

Keith, from Timperley, said: "The Victoria Arches is a fantastic space.

"The arches were used for many businesses in the 1800s and later as an air raid shelter during the Second World War.

"I have been down there a few times and you can still see the remnants from that period."

There are also tunnels and underground spaces which are the result of more modern work, such as the Guardian Exchange and the remains of the Picc-Vic railway tunnel scheme.

Keith said: "The Guardian Network is several miles long and runs from Chinatown all the way out to Ardwick.

"It is a switch telephone exchange which was used during the Cold War and is now used as a cable tunnel.

"BT keep it very secure so hardly anyone ever gets to go down there.

(Image: Keith Warrender) (Image: Keith Warrender)

"There was a fire a few years ago which knocked out the phone lines in Manchester so they are very concerned to keep it secure."

The Picc-Vic project was a proposed underground tube line in Manchester and initial work had begun on a tunnel below what is now the Arndale Centre.

Keith added: "They got well on with that space and it seemed to be certain that it would happen.

"But due to a mixture of political and financial problems the scheme was stopped.

"There is now a big void there where the station would have been."

But these are just some of the tunnels and underground spaces below the city, with some people saying they have even seen an old row of underground shops.

(Image: Keith Warrender) (Image: Keith Warrender)

"I do wonder if it is somewhere around the cathedral and were built when Manchester was much lower than it is now.

"There are quite possibly more tunnels constructed in Victorian times used by shops to gets there goods from one place to another. Some of these will still exist today but they are probably owned by various utility companies.

"In the area around Harvey Nichols there were ways out of the city and towards the cathedral, but this area was bombed during the Second World War so that area has now been redeveloped.

"There are also tunnels leading from the cathedral to Market Street which were used up to the 1930s."

‘Underground Manchester’ and ‘Below Manchester’ by Keith Warrender are available direct from Willow Publishing, local book shops or online retailers.

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What was the Picc-Vic project?

Long-lost maps and drawings have revealed how Manchester was on the verge of its own underground tube line – two decades before Metrolink arrived in the city.

The remnants of what would have been the ‘Picc-Vic tunnel’ are 30 feet below the Arndale Centre.

Experts say it would have been the centrepiece of a ‘brave new world’ of helipads, tunnels and moving pavements in 1970s Manchester.

They have identified the forgotten void, below Topshop, as the beginnings of a station which would have been at the heart of a 2.3 mile-long electrified line.

It would have linked Piccadilly and Victoria stations for the first time.

The long-forgotten project would have had four major routes and two tunnels, each 18ft wide.

Trains would have run every two-and-a-half minutes at the centre of the network and every 10 minutes further out.

Moving underground walkways would have linked Piccadilly Gardens, St Peter's Square and Oxford Road station.

Underground stations would have been built below Central Library, Whitworth Street, and the junction of Market Street and Cross Street.

The proposals were developed over 20 years. Building work was due to start in September 1973 and intended to finish by 1978.