Boris’s Flying Circus

With the end of London Mayor Boris Johnston’s reign looming after the Mayoral Election on the 3rd May 2012 minds are being concentrated. Londoner’s are taking stock of that great classicist’s achievements as Mayor. For one thing he has got rid of 275 of the proven, high capacity, disabled friendly Bendy Buses at a third of what they cost and replaced them with 5 Boris DeluxeMasters at only £1.6M a copy! This wasn’t Boris’s only achievement, oh no! He has also hiked bus fares 55%, delivered 52 affordable homes in London last year and started his silly cable car from nowhere to nearly nowhere!

Greenwich Peninsula

On the last item you can now go along to an exciting new exhibit at London Transport Museum on Boris’s only other transport initiative the UK’s first urban cable car. The exhibition opened on Tuesday 29 November 2011, and gives visitors their first taste of the new transport link in all its glory. I’m afraid all the other Boris achievements, London Overground, East London Line, DLR extension were actually all started by somebody called KEN! Boris also has an anti-achievement to his name, cancelling the Western Congestion Charging Zone, losing the income from it whilst writing off the £55 million expenditure to set it up. All this while London is endangering its citizens by breaching EU air pollution standards.

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2007/11/londons-transport-museum.html

The interactive exhibit at the Museum will be the first chance for the public to see up close up details of the cable car and gondolas which is being branded as “Emirates Air Line” after its sponsor. Highlights of the exhibit include a fully branded cabin, similar to the cabins that will take to the skies next year and fly users across the Thames every five minutes. Visitors will be able to board the cabin and see an animated film that gives an idea of the spectacular aerial views on offer once the link between the Greenwich Peninsula and Royal Victoria Dock is complete.

The stations on the new Tube Map containing the sponsor's name - the first time branding has been allowed on this iconic design classic

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2009/11/mapping-world.html

Royal Victoria Dock station

Koblenz, Germany where a similar system across the Rhine was recently built for $20 M using similar technology. Notice the simpler "temporary" stations compared to London's showpiece stations. Built at a cost of Euros 12 million the cable car travels across the Rhine from Deutsches Eck up to Ehrenbreitstein Fortress, a distance of 850 metres, giving visitors breathtaking aerial views of the Rhine and Moselle.

There are 18 gondolas on the Koblenz cable way, each with a 35-passenger capacity. And if you’re not fearful of heights, one of the cabins has a glass floor so you can look down into the Rhine as the cable car takes you across. It is expected that 3,500 passengers can be transported per hour in each direction.

The cable car will provide a new river crossing for London, travelling between two new terminals, Greenwich Peninsula south of the Thames and Royal Docks on the Northside. Expected to take its first “flight” in summer 2012 it will have a capacity to carry 2,500 passengers per hour in each direction, the equivalent to 30 buses an hour, but of course only if they turn up. The new transport initiative will also directly link the O2 – Europe’s biggest entertainment venue – and the ExCeL – Europe’s biggest conferencing venue and provide a new step-free interchange between the Jubilee line and Docklands Light Railway (DLR) whilst complementing the existing public transport network.

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2011/08/londons-dome.html

The question that probably everyone asked was how did an estimate of £25 million end up at a final project cost of £65 million. That’s quite an overspend! When finally completed, the most striking aspect of Boris’s latest folly/innovative public transport service (delete depending on political preference) will be the three tall pylons that carry the cables over the Thames.

Interior of a Gondola

Rachel at Londonlist has commented;

“Yesterday’s news that the Thames Cable Car costs have risen to £60m didn’t surprise us that much – Caroline Pidgeon got an admission out of Boris in June that it was pushing the £57m mark, but what’s made us eye-poppingly enraged is TfL telling the BBC that they’re paying for it out of the rail budget.

If TfL were swimming in cash this would be fine, but this is the same TfL that’s just announced PAYG fare increase of 10p per bus journey and an 8% rise for travel cards. A TfL that’s committed to huge upgrades on the tube network (surely a nobler cause for raiding other parts of their budget?). A TfL that’s expanding the Overground network and involved in Crossrail.”

An expert on cable car projects Steven Dale who runs the International Benchmarking site “The Gondola Project” is harsh about what London is paying for this project;

http://gondolaproject.com/2011/09/26/exploring-the-thames-cable-car-costs/

“Over the weekend it was announced that the estimated project cost for London’s Thames Cable Car (Gondola) has ballooned to an estimated £60m. For those interested, that means the system will cost roughly $100m USD per kilometre. With the possible exception of the Caracas Metrocable, the London Thames Cable Car will easily be the most expensive gondola/cable car ever built.

The London Thames Cable Car appears to be nothing more than the latest example of largely English-speaking transit agencies’ unwillingness and/or inability to rein in costs related to transit projects. There is absolutely, positively, completely no reason whatsoever this project should cost London taxpayers ~$100m USD. Not a single good reason:”

North Pylon under construction

The completed 270 Tonne pylon

The site London Reconnections points out;

http://www.londonreconnections.com/2011/where-lame-ducks-dare-benchmarking-the-london-cable-car/

“Mott MacDonald act as project advisers to TfL on this project. They are a respected engineering consultancy responsible for similar projects such as the, much longer Ngong Ping Cable Car in Hong Kong. They are also owners of Franklin and Andrews, a household name in households where banter about project construction costs is the norm across the breakfast table. Franklin and Andrews are collators and disseminators of benchmark construction cost standards through a series of “Black Books”. Mott’s could well be able to contribute international comparator information on this matter.

Further questions also seem pertinent – at what point in the project risk register were the cost omissions and deviations recognised and what mitigation processes were put in place? To what extent do the London specific tailored features, the pylons and the stations, impact on the increases in cost? To what extent, if any, did the imperative to get something done before the Olympics influence the life cycle project procurement and management process?”

The stakes are high in the London Mayoral elections next year and despite the desperate spinning going on by Boris’s acolytes there is no confidence that dilettante Boris can win even if his Flying Circus across the Thames opens in time. How important this election is to Tory prospects is demonstrated by David Cameron who has described Boris Johnson's re-election for a second term as London Mayor as his "number one priority" for 2012. In a speech last night to Conservative backbenchers, the Prime Minister described victory in the capital city as "essential" to the party's strategy. But he warned that next year would be "tougher than the first couple of years under Margaret Thatcher" because of the state of the economy. Mr Cameron was given thunderous applause at the mention of the London election battle on May 3.

Be that as may be Daithai C believes time is running out for Bluffy Boris. The fact is in the last election people in the outer donut of London didn’t vote for Boris, they voted against Ken. In four years much will have changed. Ken learnt from his defeat and has discarded General Jasper and the hangers on who did the perception of his cause much harm. The ludicrous Americans under “Agent” Bob Kiley have largely disappeared from TfL with their platinum contracts which Londoner’s of all political hues resented. Boris with his £250,000 a year for his Rag Mag columns in the Telegraph and his many “distractions” has looked increasingly amateurish while Ken is the serious candidate dedicated to making London better for all.

We are all in this Circus together?

David Cameron has rightly identified that a push to abolish government by Old Etonians in London in 2012 will gather momentum as a campaign to abolish government by Old Etonians nationwide. When it comes to the voters of London deciding whether its Ken or Boris next May Boris will not be greatly in credit with them having expensively abolished cost efficient Bendy Buses for his 5 £1.6 million a copy DeLuxemasters – A project in the fine tradition of British Worldbeaters which won’t beat anything. His Flying Circus across the Thames has “stolen” £65 million from the rail budget and the reality of its viability will be seen in the cold winter of 2012 in the post Olympic hangover when we see if it gets anything like the 2,500 passengers an hour. Whilst much has been made of the “£36 M” Emirates sponsorship this is over 10 years and is dependent on minimum traffic levels being achieved – it is not cash up front.

"Death to the Bendy's" thundered Boris!

Then think of what Boris has not done? But he was wrong to cancel the pedestrianisation of Parliament Square, and his cycling "superhighways" are feeble - London needs proper cycle lanes. He cancelled the Cross-River Tram and the Rotherhithe to Canary Wharf Bridge - we need projects like this. Yet he abolished Bendy Buses and is building his cable car – two transport initiatives with nothing approaching a business case. I suspect at the Opening Ceremonies the London Mayor representing us will have a name beginning with K and London voters will have delivered their verdict on Bluffy Boris’s vanity projects. In the cold Winter of 2012 after the Olympic glow is well gone we'll see if this gimcrack link is really viable or if it was just another Circus Act?

What was TfL saying a mere year ago?

“TfL said it aimed to fund construction of the (£25 M) scheme with private finance, adding that discussions were being held with a number of private sector organisations. A privately funded cable car system offers a relatively quick and cost effective way of improving connections across the river for pedestrians and cyclists." Guardian – 5th July 2010

Looks like the private sector have since made up their own mind not to throw money into this?