The underground mail delivery train in central London will stop operating early tomorrow, after serving the city for more than seventy years.

Dubbed Mail Rail', the automated service will be mothballed because Royal Mail says it is too expensive to operate, costing £1.2 million a day.

Despite an outcry from politicians, Royal Mail has not been able to find a new use for the service, which runs along 10 kilometres of track between Paddington and Whitechapel.

The transport committee of the Greater London Assembly pleaded with Royal Mail to consider alternative uses for the service, such as transporting valuable goods, to no avail.

Mail Rail runs computer-controlled trains carrying letters and small parcels, stopping at three stations.

In its heyday after the Second World War, Mail Rail operated 19 hours a day, 286 days a year, carrying millions of letters.

The service began in 1927, using specially built tunnels and tracks, and was expanded in the following decades.

Now, with Royal Mail trimming its costs to cope with multimillion pound losses, Mail Rail has been shunted into history.