The tunnel, now an empty concrete-lined shell that is blocked off midway by a cinderblock wall, was once well-traveled by tellers with the National Exchange Bank of Augusta.

Historians say the shaft was dug to connect the bank's vault to a drive-through teller building facing the 800 block of Reynolds Street. That drive-through building was demolished earlier this month as part of the Common project. The historic bank building will be preserved and will stand next to the park.

The Exchange Bank's operations changed names and ownership several times over the decades, eventually becoming part of SunTrust Bank.

Among those who regularly used the tunnel was Ina Murray, the mother of SunTrust Bank First Vice President Milledge Murray.

The entrance to an underground tunnel sits behind the future site of the Augusta Common park downtown. The tunnel once connected the National Exchange Bank of Augusta with a drive-through building. Half of the passage will be filled in with dirt to make way for the Augusta Common Development. ANDREW DAVIS TUCKER/STAFF

Mr. Murray said until the Common construction began, he had forgotten the tunnel.

"You had the outside drive-in, and that was a walkway from the bank to the outside," Mr. Murray recalled. "They counted money down in there. It was a safe and secure place."

The Exchange Bank building was constructed in 1922. The underground passageway wasn't built until 1952, according to fire insurance maps of downtown on file at Historic Augusta Inc.

Contractors rediscovered the passage during preconstruction planning, said Brian Franklin, the head inspector for the Department of Public Works.

"I just thought that was really neat," Mr. Franklin said. "It was the first one I'd ever heard of."

Sometime after the bank operations moved out in the late 1960s, the drive-through and bank building apparently were sold to separate owners, and a wall was erected inside the connecting tunnel to mark the property line, developers said.

"We see stuff like this all the time," said Glen Thompson, the vice president of Thompson Building and Wrecking Co., the subcontractor that is demolishing downtown buildings to make way for the Common.

Contractors will fill in half of the tunnel with dirt so the area is structurally sound enough for the foot traffic that will frequent the park after its completion, contractors said.

The other half of the tunnel, which belongs to the private owner of the bank building, will be left intact.

Reach Heidi Coryell Williams at (706) 823-3215.