The Emirates Cable Car

The Emirates Cable Car: Is it Really worth it?

Open in summer 2012, just in time for the 2012 London Olympic Games, the Thames Cable Car, officially known as The Emirates Cable car thanks to its sponsor, offers a very unique and different way to travel between Greenwich (host to the O2 Arena) and Royal Docks where one can find the ExCel Arena.

It’s a rather extravagant way to cross the river and its quite unique to London. On the short journey, which I believe doesn’t take more than ten minutes at most, offers quite spectacular views of the East London area, though much of it is still very much in development. In the northeast corner, the Olympic Park can easily be identified by the red structure of tangled metal better known The Orbit, which also offers fantastic views of London, though I was only up there at night. However, I did catch the Women’s 100m Final going on in the Stadium down below, (just one of the perks of being a Games-Maker). However, I would be utterly unable to tell you who won that as they just looked like fast running ants from where I was!

As I was saying about the Thames Cable Car, the views are pretty awesome, though there’s not an awful lot going on. It’s a bit unnerving going up high for a tiny little journey and it all seems a bit too unnecessary. I can imagine that it was once useful for those who wanted to cross the river and hop to and fro the Excel arena to the O2 Arena or the North Greenwich Arena as it was known as during the games, but when there’s not much going on in either of the places outside of the Olympic Games, I struggle to see what a use it could have. When I was there for the first time, in between the Olympic Games and the Paralympic Games, it was incredibly quite everywhere and most cars were left completely empty. It’s the sort of thing I see people, mainly tourists using once, just to check it out and perhaps never again and I certainly don’t see it being popular amongst commuters, especially when it probably costs a good deal less to simply take the tube or a bus.

Speaking of prices, travel cards are invalid on this new London transport and a single journey for a adult would cost either £4. 30 without an Oyster or £3. 20 with. Quite frankly, I’d rather stick to the more traditional means of London transport.

So, is it really worth it? I would recommend it be done at least once. I did quite enjoy it, and it’s nice to say it’s been done; I just fail to see how much of a use it will be to the City now the Olympic Games are over.