Electric air taxis/EVTOL, the future of travel & the Isle of Dogs
It might surprise some people to know we have had a heliport operating behind the Vanguard building on Westferry road, since around the year 1980
I live next to it & 1 pic is from my balcony. 1/
A new operator has acquired a 15-year lease from Vanguard to run the heliport
But the new operators Skyports are mainly doing so now to get more experience of how heliports run because long term they want to be a new type of transport operator 2/
"Skyports is a mobility company developing and operating landing infrastructure for the electric air taxi revolution" skyports.net
In places like Brazil, Dubai and Singapore, they are starting a new type of transport which may develop into a whole new industry
3/
- air taxis using electric air vehicles (like helicopters) for medium distance travel - think CW to Cambridge for example
Although one UK company talks about Canary Wharf being 13 minutes flying time to Heathrow vertical-aerospace.com 4/
The UK is not ready yet from a regulatory viewpoint so nothing will happen for years & the technology is still being developed.
This 'airport' would be mainly passenger focussed but outside of London they are looking at cargo drones deliveries but London is too dense for that 5/
Helicopters do this already to some extent but are expensive to operate, noisy, and burn fossil fuels.
In theory, electric air vehicles (which often have multiple rotors which help with noise and safety) should be much quieter than turbine engine helicopters
6/
Given the history of the Isle of Dogs shipbuilding industry including SS Great Eastern(also designed to revolutionise travel) built close by it will be interesting to see how this industry develops here but as I said we are years away from any kind of regular operation
7/
as there are so many issues to sort out first.
They have no current plans to extend the landing area out into the river (as has been discussed in the past) and they are now aware of the desire to have a continuous river walkway which they (& where I live) currently block
8/
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This @TheEconomist article is very strange, odd & not really based on much evidence
It also repeats various myths without evidence, misses the big issues, and therefore comes to the wrong conclusions
A 🧵on its inaccuracies
a. no mention of leasehold or commonhold at all ! 1/
b. it correctly says these buildings are expensive which is true but then talks about land value in England as one main reason why tall towers in big cities are expensive
Economist article in black, my comments in red
The main reason why tall towers are expensive is 2/
because construction is v expensive
As evidence this agreement that Westferry Printworks could only deliver 21% affordable housing on a big site agreed by the developer, Tower Hamlets Council & the GLA
Construction costs £630 m
v
Land value £28m
v
Taxes (CIL & s106) = £49 m 3/
The issues are more extensive than @PlanningMag article states
Councillors who made the decision to reject the resident's Yes vote in favour of the business No vote
Incorrectly, used the wrong business turnout % to suggest a higher proportion of businesses voted than residents 1/
Proportionally more residents voted than businesses
Councillors were also not officially told that:
Some of the business votes were illegal (three people voted more than twice)
49.5% of all the business vote came from a single office building
Cllrs also not told that there was
2/
an active Police investigation underway
"amid suspicions of a “possible conspiracy to subvert the referendum”, allegation of multiple voting, and claims that some business owners had exerted “undue influence” to sway the vote against the council’s plan" standard.co.uk/news/london/po…
3/
Problems with Homes of Multiple Occupation (HMO) & why a man died due to Council inaction
A man died earlier this month in a flat fire, had the Council been more proactive and responsive he might still be alive but an attempt to get them to do so in January 2021 was rejected 1/
18 people, primarily students and delivery couriers from Bangladesh, lived in a 2-bedroom former Council flat at the time of the fire, 22 beds were seen in the property including in the kitchen (mainly bunk beds)
2/
The owner had bought the leasehold flat in 2005 but the freeholder was Tower Hamlets Council and the managing agent Tower Hamlets Homes, their arm's length management agency
Neighbours made complaints about number of people & leaks from the bathroom in late 2021 and 2022
3/
New independent private primary school in Canary Wharf planning application
CW Group has applied to build a new 9-storey (thin but tall) nursery and primary school in the middle of Wood Wharf
402 pupils (150 nursery pupils and 252 primary school pupils) and 80 FTE staff 1/
Summary here constructing-london.com/wood-wharf-sch…
This would be a fee-paying school separate from the Mulberry Primary state school already built opposite this proposed new school so there would be 2 schools on site
2/
It will be run by inspiredlearninggroup.co.uk/about-us/about… and would be the 3rd private school in the area including River House & Faraday
I assume CW Group are behind the idea of building a new private school as will generate a long run income and be popular with some of their new residents
3/
Local Plan consultation response - why the Local Plan needs to change
1st round of consultations on the new Local Plan ended on Wednesday - 2nd round of consultation should be later this year after they publish the draft policies
I wrote a 13 page response to it raising some 1/
of some of my issues with it & planning here in general
Fundamentally the objective of recent London and Local Plans has been to push most development in Tower Hamlets to Aldgate, Aberfeldy, Isle of Dogs including Blackwall & other parts of Poplar 2/
Development in most of the rest of Tower Hamlets is discouraged even when they have better transport links and better infrastructure than the growth areas listed above 3/
I went to the @ConHome Defence & Security Conference today
Several questions from audience about what will happen in Ukraine
All those who answered said, they don't know the outcome
That assumes Britain has a passive role
Britain could determine the outcome by helping Ukraine 1/
More western weapons would put Ukraine in a stronger position to win
(in the same way western support helped USSR defeat Nazi Germany) @BWallaceMP mentioned 250 vehicles sent by Britain
But Ukrainians crowdfunded to buy 101 ex-British Army armoured
vehicles themselves
(Ukrainians in UK find this harder to do as UK donation websites won't allow similar campaigns in the UK to buy 'weapons')
That we had 101 retired armoured vehicles incl. ambulances ready to go but were on the open market for sale suggests Britain not as
3/