Airport upgrade
It is excellent news that the airport is being upgraded with a £4m programme of improvements.
£3m on lighting, £600k on the northern runway and £330k on ramping should make a big difference.
£3m on lighting??? Can anyone with specialist knowledge shed any, er, light on why it costs so much to replace the bulbs (that is tongue in cheek).
(We still need enough controllers so the planes are allowed to land!)
£3m on lighting, £600k on the northern runway and £330k on ramping should make a big difference.
£3m on lighting??? Can anyone with specialist knowledge shed any, er, light on why it costs so much to replace the bulbs (that is tongue in cheek).
(We still need enough controllers so the planes are allowed to land!)
3 comments:
I don't have any specialist knowledge. But would have thought that:
1. A long runway needs a lot of lights.
2. They have to be very weatherproof.
3. Above all, they have to be damned sturdy. Sturdy enough to handle a jumbo jet trundling over them. So that probably rules out Tesco economy 19p bulbs, and requires something a heck of a lot more expensive.
4. They also have to be pretty bright i.e. very visible from several miles away.
Thanks silversprite, I had naively imagined HIAL going to B&Q and buying 60,000 garden lamps at £50 a piece to replace the existing bedside lamps along the runways.
Assuming there are 3,000 bulbs, that's still £1,000 each to replace; which is still slightly more than local electricians cost.
I'm planning to tender for the work at £2.5m and subcontract the work out to the guy in the small ads in the Stornoway Gazette.
Seems a total waste of money to me. Surely with £3 million you could tarmac the whole of Barvas Moor and provide all-weather sports facilities to the local schoolchildren who could use the turbines as goalposts. At least that way the local community can get some benefit from this worthwhile desecration - sorry development - while us folks down in England enjoy all the electricity.
Post a Comment