Here you go [PDF]. 64 pages and some crayoning
Been the usual (doubtless Kit Malthouse-inspired) PR blitz over the last few days, but, to my mind, no great wave of enthusiasm. Perhaps people aren’t especially receptive to huge unfunded transport projects just at the moment, or perhaps the report itself isn’t up to much as a call to arms for the C_FIT fraternity. Certainly initial Twitter reaction has been highly derogatory, although that’s Helen and Political Animal so far. Links elsewhere during the recent blitz include:
- Evening Standard covering the lack of cohesion with central Tory policy
- Kent News covering Boris’s cycling buddy Lord Adonis’s dismissal of the whole thing on the Politics Show, which also apparently included Gareth Knight of the Tory toddler group C_FIT, which they’re awfully pleased about. Listen, boys and girls, I’ve been on that, and if they’ll have me on they’ll have anyone (Christian Wolmar was ‘busy’, apparently).
- BBC video with rather a bizarre diagram apparently showing the rail link joining HS1 in the middle of the North Downs Tunnel
- Usual Sunday Times puffery, although at least they printed my comment complete with the word ‘bonkers’
- Yorkshire Ranter with an excellent piece pondering whether there is actually anything there between Team Boris’s ears or if it’s as insubstantial and wayward as it appears, using the TEA-bagging as an example – ‘appealing to “sheikhs” as the answer to financing anything deserves to be the standard marker of amateur hour’. Indeed.
What’s most pleasing, I suppose, is the confirmation that all the guesswork and dredger-following we did earlier in the year really did get the location nailed on. It’s essentially the amateur Marinair proposals that have been kicking around for a few years, mildly warmed over by an aging engineer. Actually, from a skim through, I stick to my first impression, this is an engineer telegraphing ‘DON’T DO IT’ without actually saying so. There’s a bit that clearly says ‘look, chaps, this is beyond my remit, you need to think a whole lot bigger’. Bigger? Cripes. It was hardly a London issue in the first place and it can’t be the Mayor of London’s role to reshape the whole coastline of the south-east like a JCB-driving Canute. This leads one to suspect that even if you can persuade the Tory transport team of the merits (which isn’t a given) you also have to persuade whichever gang they’ve got in charge of regional policy, too.
Anyway, I’d better go and read the rest of it, hadn’t I?
Update – Total rubbish. Basically takes 64 pages to say ‘I don’t know where to put it, I don’t know how to fund it and you need to redesign the estuary for it to make any sense at all’. Any report that starts off by analysing what the amateur idiots with grand schemes and no clue have to offer and *using that as a baseline* is not to be taken seriously.
Boris, of course, is appointing Sir David King, a full on climate change evangelist and perfectly sound scientist, to head up a working group including failed airline tycoon Kit Malthouse and the man formerly with the most useless job in government, Nick Raynsford. There’s also a strong whiff of pork in the air, courtesy of a company set up by Oakervee and the GLA’s Bridget Rosewell, who needs watching on this evidence.
Other reaction:
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Bridget just happens to be Chair of Volterra Consulting. I wonder who the competitive tenders for construction would come from? Hmm.
Well what the hell was Boris Johnson going to do ? Invent floating runways because we are expecting sea levels to rise. This Mayoralty is completely Delirius and Deluded as people have started to point out . We should be demanding that Doug Oakervee does not get paid unless of course he can design and build six Floating Runways . I sincerely hope that the London Tax Payer is not to foot the bill on this Fairy Land project otherwise someone has had a right good earner at our expense for nothing.
One Big Question I Want To Know : Did Doug Oakervee or any others concerned with this Airport Project first consult with Aviation Experts to do or consider a Risk Assessment regarding the location of this Airport in the Thames Estuary . You would have thought that it was important to see what the Aviation industry and experts had to say before doing expensive surveys and reports as my ” Gut Feeling ” is that an Airport situated in the Thames Estuary would have been exposed to extremely bad weather conditions in the winter months that would have been highly dangerous for aircraft taking of and landing on a raised Island . Also you would need to consider the implications of rising sea levels and the impact that would have to the Islands structure due to high tides and strong storms. Also there is the possibility of the Island becoming swamped by sea in a few years time. I personally think that Boris Johnson and others did not consult aviation experts to get their opinion or advise regarding the location of the Airport and to do a risk assessment , if this is the case people should be questioning why Boris and others went through this great expense and done these surveys and reports. Maybe Boris Johnson and others were running before they could walk on this project , if so ” WHY ? “.
To be honest the report doesn’t even say where the thing should be, let along getting into serious engineering detail – it basically says ‘woo, this is a bit big, I don’t know guv, it’s above my pay grade, why not set up a bigger committee and have a better look at it and by the way you need to decide next year?’. I’m not sure the lack of a risk assessment is the worst thing about it, to be honest.
There’s a big mistake on page 27, where Oakervee claims that 8 GW represents “7% of the energy needs for England and Wales”. This seems to be out by a factor of two or more.
Source: David MacKay estimates in that (neglecting embedded energy in imported goods), “The UK average [energy consumption] is 125 kWh per day per person”. Multiplied by the population of England and Wales (54 million) gives about 280 GW. The figure of 8 GW is only about 2.8% of this, not 7% as Oakervee claims.
Tom
My point was that if you intended building an Airport in such a location as the Thames Estuary you would first have to consult aviation experts to establish if it was safe to do so before going through the enormous expense of paying people or companies for surveys and reports or any other associated expenses. Ive also heard a rumour that some birds are feathering their nests during the winter in the Thames Estuary.
“you would first have to consult aviation experts to establish if it was safe to do so”
The first thing they’d ask would be ‘where are you putting it and what direction are the runways facing’ to which the current answer is ‘Dunno. Somewhere off Whitstable’ to which the reply would be ‘come back when you’re being serious’.
For some weeks now a map and the proposed plans have been publicized of where the Airport was going to go and be built . That was in the Thames Estuary , maybe then aircraft safety is not the first issue before going any further.
“For some weeks now a map and the proposed plans have been publicized of where the Airport was going to go and be built”
Not one you could show to anyone involved professionally without being laughed out of the room, though. Actually, I recommend two bits of the report to you a) the migratory bird route map and b) the plot of actual current air traffic over the area, which suggests to me that fitting in a new airport’s approach routes is potentially the hardest issue there.
I personally believed from the beginning that this project had no prospect of getting of the ground because there are to many high hurdles to get over. I am surprised that Boris Johnson has pressed on with it and I wonder why . But what I know is that an Airport , could not , and will not be built in the Thames Estuary .
Come on folks – are you surprised really?
Boris ploughs on into taxpayers coffers (because it will be) after a plan which is popular (because nobody wants to expand Heathrow) but impractical and expensive.
Bendy buses? – Can’t you see the pattern emerging?
Don’t forget Boris is a popularist politican before he is a Mayor. He doesn’t care if it’s actually faesible as long as he can convince the public that he’s ‘trying his best’.
Here’s a suggestion, how about we build high speed trains and tunnels to Schipol, Charles De Gaulle and other nearby airport interchanges.
That way we can still travel by air, check in on the train (to avoid queing at the airport) and the noise is some poor frenchman’s (or Dutch etc.) problem.
I would also suggest that if we’re going to build an airport on water – let’s make it halfway out to sea so we can avoid the problems with migrating birds and reduce the chances of a plane crashing in densely populated Hounslow.
….it might also make Windsor bareable in the summer..