Atop the BT Tower

Today, I was lucky enough to look down upon London from the top of the BT Tower.

The BT Tower has been closed to the public for thirty years, after a bomb exploded in the revolving restaurant in the 70s. As part of the Open House London initiative, BT allowed a very limited number of people to travel to the revolving restaurant on the 34th floor, for coffee and cake as the restaurant completed a 22 minute revolve.

From what I was told, only 500 of the over 300,000 people that applied for a ticket were successful, and there are no scheduled public openings planned again.

The BT Tower restaurant is still used for special BT corporate events, but rarely revolves these days. It’s also rarely accustomed to so many visitors, and the express lifts were running at 50% of their normal speed, to spare the cables.

The view from the top is truly awesome, and it’s a little disconcerting seeing the London Medivac helicopter flying lower than your altitude.

BT did a top job today… Our pre-booked session lasted around 45 minutes, was organised to precision, and the free tea, coffee and cupcake at the top was very welcome… as was the complimentary certificate we were handed at bottom.

It was also good to chat to a couple of very knowledgeable chaps from BT, who look after BT’s collection of artifacts, which used to be housed at he now closed London BT Museum. It seems that the BT Tower still forms a part of the infrastructure, housing many important broadcast links, including the Freeview multiplexes. The microwave dishes at the top are now largely unused, as fibre cables are commonplace and have a hugely higher capacity than a microwave link.

All in all, a great experience. There’s talk that BT may open the Tower again in some capacity for the 2012 Olympics, but that’s far from certain. In the off-chance anyone from BT is reading – top job chaps, and thanks for the opportunity. Same time next year?

As I make my way back home, clutching my souvenir certificate, smiling to myself, the words of the odd chap in the bright cardigan are very applicable… He could see me avidly studying photos, he asked where we’d been. When told, his statement was simple – “You lucky b****ard”. He’s right – I am!