Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
26 August 2009
09:5528022I see with a kind of resentful jealous and gutted air, that the Red Arrows are appearing in Folkestone this coming weekend and will be doing a full display. Oh the humiliation!! Why can Folkestone, who are celebrating nothing at all, have a full display by the fab Red Arrows, and Dover, which was in huge centenary celebration of Bleriots first flight across the channel, couldnt get them at all. Well, couldnt get them to do any more than a three second flypast.
If this doesnt just take the biscuit. I feel very sorry indeed for the literally thousands and thousands of people who turned up on Dover seafront expecting a display. Lets not shilly shally here...they were expecting a display!
Casting a glance back, the celebrations were good on the ground but the aerial content was extremely weak. Draft in some outside 'high flyers' and I use the term loosely, who promised this and that, but in the end had to give refunds to those who turned up the Duke of Yorks and paid £10 for the privilege...as nothing flew...or very little. As it was a paid event they should have had a plan b if the wind got up!
Anyway there we are, Gripe over. But I feel both Dover and more importantly all those people on the seafront were let down by poor aerial content and a three second flypast. And now...Folkestone gets the full monty...strewth!!
Guest 651- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 5,673
26 August 2009
12:0628024I thought this is to do with a commercial event where they have paid a large sum for a display (the racecourse). You get what you pay.
Been nice knowing you :)
DT1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 15 Apr 2008
- Posts: 1,116
26 August 2009
12:3428025Yes I felt disappointed, even though I knew it was not going to be a display. I think it has to be an all or nothing when dealing with this kind of thing.
That said I have heard from a couple of fairly reliable sources that it was not a case of 'get what you pay for'. In fact it was yet another example of how DHB have this town under their control. Taking what they need and giving nothing back!
Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
26 August 2009
15:3228033Yes I heard some grumblings about the DHB too but whether there is any substance to it I dont know. Surely even they would not scupper the Bleriot celebrations, as without the Red Arrows it all turned out to be rather tame. Yet a couple of weeks later up pops Folkestone with the full display which is particularly galling.
DT1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 15 Apr 2008
- Posts: 1,116
26 August 2009
17:0528037"Surely even they would not scupper the Bleriot celebrations, as without the Red Arrows it all turned out to be rather tame"
You write that as if they actually care. I have no doubts about my sources or why the Red Arrows were not prepared to perform.
Guest 651- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 5,673
26 August 2009
17:0928039Perhaps having to deal with a profit making company (rather than say the Dover Regatta team) put DHB off ?
If I (like DHB) were a contacted by a body that wanted to make money at the same time as I lost it - I would would turn it down. It it were a charity or similar I would more likely say yes.
Been nice knowing you :)
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
26 August 2009
19:1528047my understanding was that the harbour board were unhappy at the prospect of having to close the docks down for half an hour whilst the arrows were performing.
i thought that was general knowledge.
Sue Nicholas- Location: river
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 6,023
26 August 2009
19:5228058Mt understanding Howard
DT1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 15 Apr 2008
- Posts: 1,116
26 August 2009
20:2128062Well I think this should be made truly general and remind people what an asset to the town the port is not!
We are so lucky that DHB are arbiters of major events in the town, profit making or not. I'm sure it would be a large financial loss having to freeze the port for 1/2 an hour, especially compared to the profits from the Bleriot weekend. However to the port this would be negligable.
Infact it would be quite easy to work out this amount to the nearest £1000, it's nice when things are so simply quantified. It's a shame the effects the infrastructure of the port has on the town is not so quantifiable. If it was it would be quite nice to start charging these selfish dictators, to perhaps allow the port to start working for the town and vice versa.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
26 August 2009
20:5528066maybe a change at the top would help relations between the port and the town ?
the fiasco of the weekend when the disabled servicemen crossed the channel and were met with a resounding silence from the non assembled throng still makes me cringe.
some of the ferry companies have tried to connect with the town, why not the harbour board?
i suspect that the problem is the same as with the cabinet at ddc, no-one actually lives here, nigel excepted.
Guest 671- Registered: 4 May 2008
- Posts: 2,095
26 August 2009
21:1228069PaulB.
It could be because they cost £7305.78 plus insurance, plus accommodation (4star) plus travel costs.
I am not happy because I asked for flypast and was told they were not in the area, I am sure Folkestone is close for a jet plane?
"My New Year's Resolution, is to try and emulate Marek's level of chilled out, thoughtfulness and humour towards other forumites and not lose my decorum"
Brian Dixon
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
26 August 2009
21:1828072dont they park up at manstone airport.now which town is the nearist?.
27 August 2009
00:1928075Give it any excuse / reason you like. Fact is, Dover was short-changed. Again.
Guest 673- Registered: 16 Jun 2008
- Posts: 1,388
27 August 2009
00:3328076It is correct that no shipping movements are permitted whilst an air display is in progress over the harbour. This may or may not be related to the accident which befell one of the Red Arrows during a display at Brighton in 1980 when it clipped the mast of a yacht and crashed into the sea between the piers.
http://www.mybrightonandhove.org.uk/page_id__6360.aspx
Suspending port operations for half an hour on one of the busiest weekends of the year would have been an immense inconvenience to the travelling public and would have caused a backlog of traffic to build up on the roads into the port. Since these were already jampacked with cars attending the Bleriot events, it would appear a recipe for gridlock with neither the ferry traffic nor the event goers getting to where they wanted to be.
I hold no remit whatsoever for the harbour board bearing in mind their disgraceful treatment of their workforce and their oft-refuted plans to sell off the port but the above would appear to be sound reasons for not suspending the operations of the busiest ferry port in Western Europe to enable an air display.
If so, it is to DHB's discredit that they have not managed to communicate these reasons to the population of Dover but I would charitably attribute this to a general lack of awareness and professionalism amongst the placemen currently appointed to the board rather than to an intentionally dismissive attitude to the locals. I could be wrong.
The other point I would like to pick up on is that of funding said air display. Why is it considered that the harbour board should be funding an air display commemorating the first powered aircraft to fly across the channel? They are running a seaport not an airport. Would it not be more appropriate to enquire why aeronautical bodies have not funded a display, or DDC as representative of the local community?
Brian Dixon- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
27 August 2009
07:4128080hang on a moment dont we get that at least once a week now.
DT1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 15 Apr 2008
- Posts: 1,116
27 August 2009
08:2528081If DHB cannot deal with the logistics of suspend port activities for ½ an hour it only proves one of 2 things. 1) The current infrastructure to facilitate the port is inadequate as this is surely a common occurrence due to weather conditions. 2) They have no interest in working with the local community. I totally agree with condemnation of the board with respect to the treatment of a committed workforce. This just another descriptor of the contempt they hold for the locality. And yes, it is the management, their PR and general approach that form the problems.
I don't think the port should have to fund such a display but at least support it. As I say it is easy to quantify port operations but not quite so easy when measuring social capital or issues arising from town planning. As for questioning the appropriateness of a sea port supporting an aeronautical display, I don't see this as a problem. The defining signifier in all of these events is the channel and our proximity to the continent, Dover. They exploit the very same concept as Bleriot, so I see them as perfectly appropriate. Their actions (not by our election) also impact on the local community and directly influence (and restrict) the actions of our elected representatives.
Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
27 August 2009
16:3428090Ed there were air displays without any halting of shipping, albeit of the more minor kind. Example: a spitfire powered its way on sunday over the shipping adding much thrill to the passengers aboard the P & O it whizzed over. Then there was the Lancaster bomber on saturday, not to mention the humble Stearman. However, I know...these are not on the same scale, but was it just pig struck intransigence or is it all pie in the sky. I mean I had heard this DHB story before but i didnt really give a great deal of credence to it, because these types of stories whizz around the internet and they become inaccurate fact rather than truth.
As for their communication with the town...well nothing new there alas. I would write to Bill Fawcus right now to ask for his comment. I did have his email but it went out with the baby and the bathwater when my last computer blew its gasket.
Does anyone have his email??
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
27 August 2009
16:3828091A friend of mine has just started a tourism business, doing tours of the Kent Battle of Britain airfields by both air and land. Part of this tour is a helicopter ride over the White Cliffs of Dover with a private air display of a Spitfire manouevering around the helicopter. It sound fantastic and a real snip at around £650....
Hopefuly with this business we might see a spit more often over the town in future. I just hope the business succeeds in thsi difficult climate.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
27 August 2009
16:5728093BarryW
I wish your friend the very best of luck with his new and exciting business venture.Hopefully it will attract visitors from both home and abroad. This is just what the area needs.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
27 August 2009
17:0428094Not a terribly good picture below but it will add to the gist of my post above..
by the way thanks for that info GARYC re the Red Arrow costs...not cheap but we can afford it, at a push..
email: dover7@msn.com