Will Boris’s airport island ever take off?

Boris Island, well not really an island, more of a peninsula off the north Kent coast near the Isle of Sheppey. This is Mayor of London Boris Johnson’s latest attention seeking idea to increase capacity in London’s airports. A piece of land reclaimed from the Kent mud flats to build London’s fourth airport with major road and rail links into the capital. A 20 year project with an estimated cost of £50 billion.

An idea not as far stretched as first seems as it is not the first time such a proposal has been put forward. Growing up in Southend on Sea I recall another such plan at Foulness Island off the Essex coast to build what would then be London’s third airport. They even went as far as reclaiming land on the Maplin sand banks to test for erosion which was clearly visible from Southend beach on a clear day as I was playing in the famous Southend mud. It never went ahead and the government opted to expand Stansted as London’s third airport. Many people at the time believe that was always the preferred option and Foulness was a decoy to show they had exhausted every other possibility.

A report from a 1967 issue of Flight International can be found here:

In 2008 the newly elected Mayor of London, Boris Johnson tried to resurrect the Foulness option but the idea never got off the ground. (pun intended).

Timing is always important in politics and with the Mayoral elections due in May 2012 and the Tories not being every Londoners’ cup of tea at present our Boris needs a vote winning gimmick. You see the people of north Kent can’t vote for Boris or any other mayoral candidate, so he can suggest whatever he wants for outside of the capital. The people of west London however will vote for him if he comes up with a cunning plan to limit any further expansion at Heathrow.

Boris Island contains several flaws but I suspect our Boris already knows that, being an ex Eton boy. Apart from a being one of Britain’s few remaining natural wetlands there is the small issue of the SS Richard Montgomery.

A US munitions ship, it sunk in the Thames in 1944 containing 15,000 tons of high explosives. It is still there, less than a mile from the site of Boris’s proposed airport. The reason it is still there is because the safest option is to leave it well alone. It has been said that if it ever went off it would take out every window in Southend, 4 miles away.

Details of all previous Estuary airport proposals can be found here from the House of Commons library.

Of course Southend has its own airport. Not a large one until recently bought by Stobarts of Eddie Stobart fame. Southend airport has just had its runway extended at considerable cost which involved the re-routing of a major road to enable the larger passenger jets to land. Stobarts have also built a new passenger rail terminal at the airport on the London Liverpool Street line which runs through to the Olympic village at Stratford. A new air passenger terminal and hotel are under construction due for completion in time for the Olympics. What a splendid way of showing that you can fly in thousands of passengers in a short space of time and have them in central London an hour after landing.

Meanwhile as Boris Johnson is grabbing election winning headlines, Southend is slowly being developed as London’s fourth airport. Remember when it happens, you read it here first.