Heathrow in numbers - how the UK's biggest airport is getting ready for the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
Some 500,000 people will be flying into London for the Olympics and Paralympics this summer.
That includes 100,000 athletes, 20,000 members of the media and 150 heads of state. Most of them will arrive via Heathrow.
It will be the start and finish line for the bulk of visitors, giving the country's biggest airport its busiest day ever.
That day will be Monday 13 August, the day after the closing ceremony and the day 65% of visitors are planning to leave.
Some 203,000 bags will be squeezed on to the baggage system - that's 35% more than on a normal day and about 13,000 more than it is designed to handle.
Of those bags, 15,000 will be oversized - full of canoes, javelins, bikes and poles for the pole vault. There will also be more than 980 firearms to check, plus ammunition.
'Heavily-congested skies'A special temporary terminal is being built just for the "Games family" - athletes and coaches to you and me.
It will be open for three days, snuggled between terminals four and five, and will boast 31 check-in desks and seven security lanes.
Meanwhile, hundreds of extra border staff - they will not give an exact figure - will be on hand to try to keep passport queues down.
Sixteen mobile teams of 10 guards each will be available to target trouble spots if, or should that be when, the queues build up.
It is not just Heathrow of course.
Air traffic control is facing its biggest ever challenge, coping with heavily-congested skies, the threat of a terror attack and possible bad weather. Twenty-five controllers are practising in the simulator every day.
In all, 400 have been specially trained over the past four years to deal with the extra workload.
Any rogue planes should be spotted within two to three minutes, after which military controllers take over that zone and a decision is made whether or not to scramble fast jets.
Extra plane?The Paralympics is a third of the size of the main event but it is still a huge challenge.
“Start Quote
End QuoteThe Chinese team are arriving on 27 different planes and they'll probably need an extra plane at the end to carry all their medals”
Heathrow will have to deal with a month's worth of wheelchair users in just a week - about 1,800 in total.
Thirteen new scissor lifts and 100 new ramps have been deployed to load and unload wheelchairs while there are six new powered stair climbers to move large electric wheelchairs.
Two-hundred extra staff will welcome the Paralympians and help with the biggest challenge of all - making sure every athlete is reunited quickly with their chair.
As one Paralympian put it, you wouldn't expect able-bodied athletes to leave the plane in someone else's trainers would you?
The Chinese team are arriving on 27 different planes and they'll probably need an extra plane at the end to carry all their medals. I made that last bit up.
Finally, 1,000 local volunteers will greet athletes off the plane, help with their luggage and welcome them to London.
Then a few weeks later, as the Olympic flame dies, those volunteers will wave them off again as they head for home.
One thousand people will be standing there waving goodbye at planes, so if you happen to be going on holiday that day, you might want to wave back.
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
Great Portland’s Asset Values Increase on London Office Demand - Bloomberg
Great Portland Estates Plc (GPOR), the real- estate developer focused on London’s West End, said net asset value rose about 12 percent in fiscal 2012 as the value of its properties and developments increased.
The net asset value at March 31 was 403 pence a share, up from 360 pence a year earlier, the London-based company said in a statement today. The valuation of Great Portland’s portfolio gained 9.2 percent on a like-for-like basis.
“London continues to attract a significant flow of investment capital from around the world,” Chief Executive Officer Toby Courtauld said in a statement. “As a result, we expect yields for prime assets, particularly in the West End, to remain stable.”
Central London offices, retail and industrial units are the only parts of the U.K. commercial property market rising in value, Investment Property Databank Ltd. said May 15. Great Portland reported 88 new leasings, including joint ventures, that will generate 25.2 million pounds of rent a year.
Rents will probably rise in the next few years, “given the scarcity of development finance and minimal development completions” in London, Courtauld said.
To contact the reporters on this story: Neil Callanan in London at ncallanan@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Andrew Blackman at ablackman@bloomberg.net
Source: www.bloomberg.com
London Thames boat race man Trenton Oldfield due in court - london24.com
Trenton Oldfield after he was pulled from the River Thames PIC: Anthony Devlin/PA Wire
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
7:57 AM
The swimmer who brought the Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race to a dramatic halt is due to appear in court today.
Trenton Oldfield, 36, caused chaos by swimming out into the path of the boats in a protest against elitism at the Chiswick Eyot, on April 23.
He is due to plea at Isleworth Crown Court in west London on a charge of public nuisance.
Oldfield was previously banned from the State opening of parliament and from places where Jubilee events were taking place.
He was also not allowed within 100 metres of roads on the Olympic torch route.
Oldfield sparked scenes of chaos when he swam towards the boats as they were neck and neck between the two and three-mile markers.
The race was restarted nearly half an hour later, with Cambridge sealing an easy victory.
Oldfield, of Myrdle Street, east London, later defended his anti-elitist stance online.
“With the severe deficit in democracy new sites of protest unfortunately have had to be found” and “if its jail time, so be it (sic),” he wrote.
He added: “Still waiting for someone to show me when elitism (seeing oneself above another) hasn’t lead to oppression and tyranny?”
Oldfield’s antics inspired a spoof video which played on the rhyming of his name Trenton, with that of out-of-control dog Fenton in Richmond Park.
Audio from that 2011 YouTube viral hit plays over footage Oldfield swimming into the Thames.
Source: www.london24.com
The Olympic and Paralympic Games will be the biggest sporting event in the UK this year. Will you be travelling to the UK to see the Games? Please send us your comments and experiences.