On 18 April 2011, Transport- for-London (TfL) announced that the Thames cable car crossing project connecting the North Greenwich peninsular and the Victoria Dock and spanning the Thames will start construction in the summer.  Costing some £50 million, it will have a capacity of 2,500 passengers per hour and give spectacular views from over 50 metres above the Thames.  

This will be the first mass transit aerial tramway in the UK and only one of few in Europe (e.g. Cologne).   

When first planned in 2010, this new link was to take two years to construct and would be entirely publicly funded.  Now it appears that the crossing will be funded up front to ensure an early start and possibly to be completed by the 2012 London Olympics where it would connect the two Olympic venues from the O2 area South of the Thames and to the main Olympic venue just north of the Royal Docks.  

Whilst this has not really hit the national news with any impact, the race to get it ready for the Olympics has undoubtedly accelerated the project to give the operators a chance to get an early boost to its revenues.  Some construction industry commentators believe that completing the structure in 11 or 12 months will be a great challenge but the project would provide a long-term benefit to the transit infrastructure to the East of London and across the Thames.  Boris Johnson, Mayor of London said that this will be an iconic structure just like the London Eye.   

I was involved in the early planning stages of 1992/3 attempt to put in a privately funded aerial ropeway across the Thames.  It’s raison d’etre was to provide a short and medium-term solution for North Kent Rail passengers to quickly get into Canary Wharf, London City Airport and to kick start commercial development in the Royal Docks. This called for a river crossing from adjacent to Woolwich Rail Station on the North Kent Line, to the North Woolwich peninsular and London City Airport with 500 seat articulated aerial gondolas and with a 2,500+ passenger/hour capacity.    

The aerial ropeway service was a simple idea to get things moving to the East of London prior to any rail tunnel under the Thames from North Woolwich to South Woolwich, was planned to be an extension of the North London line on the North Woolwich peninsular.  Other options were considered at this early stage including one North – South from Canary Wharf and the other remarkably like the present project.  Our project relied on speed of execution to take advantage of a lack of a real alternative prior to the rail extension being given the go-ahead.  The early start would have provided a profit from the revenue and a payback of the capital with 9 years as I remember.

In the event, delays and possibly lack of vision made this raison d’etre go away and the project died, even though there was some credible support.  I was personally quite disappointed as a member of the London City Airport management team as the wrangling went on and as the other more permanent river crossing became more of a future reality.   Imagine my pleasant surprise to see the report in media of the go-ahead for a the current project.  

My only worries are the current scheme’s business model and the airport safeguarding. If it is built in time with the TfL up-front funding, then there is a good chance that the 2012 Olympics will give the scheme a great financial boost right at the start of its life.  If, as the engineering lobby think, time is too short for completion in 11 months from a summer start, then it has to have other longer term attraction and longer-term funding to achieve a reasonable pay back period.  

It is some years since I helped set up the airport’s 1,200 m long runway safeguarding surfaces and so there must be a great deal of operational data to make an informed risk decision on this 55 metre high ropeway obstruction close to the extended runway centreline. I have no doubt, however, that it will be a London Icon just like the London Eye.  Let’s hope it pays it’s way – The London Eye certainly does.  I hope my heart is not ruling my head when I say: “Good luck.”  

The author, Philip Norris is Principal Consultant and Managing Director of Norris Management Ltd.  In a long and varied career, Phil has been a Programme and Project Manager for high profile projects in the Construction and Transportation fields; a highlight of which was planning, design and construction of London City Airport and its extension for Jets. His knowledge of this area East of London makes him an authority on transportation there.  In recent years, he has provided much needed support as a management consultant to corporate and SME clients supporting and leading major infrastructure bid.