Recently in Thames Gateway Category

Further to last Wednesday's blog (and I must apologise for the increasingly rabid nature of these postings, but spare a thought for me sometimes - it really is wearing being this incandescent with rage the whole time).

Dr Evans and Twitter drew my attention to the truly excellent definition of the Thames Gateway to be found in the UKR Regeneration Dictionary, viz: The Thames Gateway "A slightly silly name (how can a gateway be 40 miles long?) for a blameless and still largely unknown part of the South East where the standard of living is shockingly below the rest of the region for a surprisingly large proportion of the 1.5m population, and which, with thoughtful long-term planning and investment could become a much better and more attractive place to live and relieve the development pressure on other more congested locations elsewhere; but which had the misfortune to become a focus of government action, and a battleground between ill-informed brownfield romantics, development fetishists, regeneration fantasists and disaster junkies."

The lovely David Thame of EG called me to pick my brains about his upcoming feature for the magazine on the prospects for London regeneration schemes.  In a (somewhat breathless) list he was seeking intelligence on Elephant and Castle, the East End (Stratford, Bromley by Bow, Royal Docks) and Battersea Power Station ("just because something is up for sale", he asked, "does that mean there will be activity?") with Nine Elms generally.  Oh, and for good measure, Earls Court, Wembley, the Greenwich Peninsula, Canning Town, Lewisham Gateway and Brent Cross/Cricklewood.
 
Whew! I said.  Calm down dear, for goodness sake, you'll have a hernia!  
 
But he was seeking some proper thoughts on which of these could be serious prospects for progress in 2012, and which might end up moving a little slower, so of course I tried to be helpful.  But you won't be surprised to learn my prognosis was a little bleak.

Regular readers of this blog will know that I have been pretty dismissive of the plans to erect a cable car over the Thames (see blog 5 July 2010). My less than enthusiastic response is due in part to the exhaustion currently surrounding infrastructure projects and regeneration, and in part to a clear line of sight as to where the funding would come from; but also stems from a rather naff experience I had when I was at Kent Thameside, where we had the stonking idea of slinging a cable car across the Thames from Gravesend to Tilbury and you'd think I had proposed starting World War Three!

But it appears that my cynicism may have been somewhat misplaced as the scheme has now been approved by the London Borough of Greenwich, the London Borough of Newham AND the Thames London Gateway Corporation. It still has to go to the Greater London Authority for final approval but it would appear that the ducks are lining up.

Of course the other fly in the ointment, which I hadn't spotted before (such a schoolgirl error this) is good old 'elf and safety. It really is one of our more dreary British institutions. And sure enough, the Mayor's office has now said that Boris Johnson had received letters suggesting that further safety analysis of the cable car application be carried out in relation to the expansion of City Airport and that, "To be certain these concerns are addressed he has asked the boroughs to withdraw their referrals while TFL commission a national air traffic services safety assessment. The results of that will be given to the boroughs for their consideration. They would then be able to refer their applications back to the Mayor's office asking him to approve a cable car that would provide a further much needed river crossing in the east of the city."

For old time's sake, I whizzed down to the Thames Gateway Forum (TGF) - predictably a little scaled-down to meet economic circumstances, and shifted from its previous venue, at ExCeL, to the Indigo suite at the O2. 

The TGF has been running for five years now and it was a great privilege for me to work with the entrepreneurs who started up the project. Indeed, when I first I met the organisers (I was chief executive at Kent Thameside at the time), I was so blown away by their passion and energy that I think it's fair to say that I "got it" straight away. So I set about working night and day to make the show a success and to glean benefits for Dartford and Gravesham. And it all worked!  

In the first year it was Kent Thameside who set the tone, with more folk on our stand (and we had the longest visit with the Sainted Prezza). I brought 30 back-bench councillors from our boroughs to ExCeL to meet people (something that I could never do for MIPIM) and the TGF went from strength-to-strength: the proof being when the start-up team sold the show to one of the UK's most established publishing houses in 2007.

Indeed, a cynical commentator (but certainly not me, m'lud) could make the waspish observation that the TGF was such a runaway success that it had become rather disconnected from the lack of real progress on the ground in the Gateway.

Tootled off to the Thames Gateway Parliamentary Reception Monday night over at the Institute of Civil Engineers (pictured right) in Great George Street, and quite wonderful to reconnect with everyone.

Always a good start to any party if you - at the very first off - bump into Alex King, Deputy Leader of Kent council and Andrew Bowles, Leader of Swale council. Plotting together naturally. Two more redoubtable politicians you could not care to meet. Quite formidable. They get things done.

A bit of joshing ensued of course and then we three were joined by the wondrous Stephen Jordan of London and Continental Railways - the supreme voice of reason in a world of regeneration madness.

He has kindly "joined" (press-ganged more like) my nominations committee for the BURA elections (which are currently underway, btw).

Always wonderful to see these guys, particularly when sparking off each other, always good value.

I have to say, the "localism" agenda could well be the saving of the Gateway: Stephen Castle, the lead member for regeneration for Essex County Council and Deputy Chairman of the Thames Gateway Essex Partnership made the best speech I have ever heard on the Thames Gateway (this is saying something, given how many years I've spent listening to speeches on the subject!) and seemingly without notes.