Heathrow Expansion

[saaby93]

Swervin_Mervin said:

http://mantp.co.uk

That fly through - is that the most childish ever?
Where's the mancunian accent?

[ruggedscotty]

saaby93 said:

ruggedscotty said:

Heathrow is where it needs to be,

its already got the infrastructure,

ruggedscotty said:

It needs a rail system

All around heathrow you have the companies that service the planes produce the food and generally cover all the needs to provide an airport with the basics to operate.


Not just the roads and railways are covered by the infrastructure. but a whole host of other businesses and these are already well established at Heathrow.


As said draw a circle 5 miles round heathrow and look for areas that you could build parking hotels and a station hub. then link that to the airport. 15 minute trains. quick connections.

[anonymous-user]

I can’t see it happening TBH. Future governments will kick off the whole process again & again.
If the runway is built by 2050 i’ll eat my hat!

[saaby93]

And that's the problem - ok they can decide its going to go there but with so many hurdles how long does it take?
Someone posted about Manchester earlier and how its just getting on and happening
If you assume most people that land at Heathrow just hop on another plane and go somewhere else where would be the best place to do that?

[djc206]

saaby93 said:

And that's the problem - ok they can decide its going to go there but with so many hurdles how long does it take?
Someone posted about Manchester earlier and how its just getting on and happening
If you assume most people that land at Heathrow just hop on another plane and go somewhere else where would be the best place to do that?

If you were to make that assumption you’d be wrong. Roughly 30% of Heathrow passengers are transit passengers.

[saaby93]

djc206 said:

saaby93 said:

And that's the problem - ok they can decide its going to go there but with so many hurdles how long does it take?
Someone posted about Manchester earlier and how its just getting on and happening
If you assume most people that land at Heathrow just hop on another plane and go somewhere else where would be the best place to do that?

If you were to make that assumption you’d be wrong. Roughly 30% of Heathrow passengers are transit passengers.

ok it was a first guess
Where do the other 2/3rds want to go?
Is upper Heyford about the right size and in the right place for transport links to get something going relatively quickly

[djc206]

saaby93 said:

ok it was a first guess
Where do the other 2/3rds want to go?
Is upper Heyford about the right size and in the right place for transport links to get something going relatively quickly

If the political will exists Heathrow would be the right place to get something going quickly.

[saaby93]

djc206 said:

saaby93 said:

ok it was a first guess
Where do the other 2/3rds want to go?
Is upper Heyford about the right size and in the right place for transport links to get something going relatively quickly

If the political will exists Heathrow would be the right place to get something going quickly.

patently not

[djc206]

saaby93 said:

patently not

There’s not the political will to do it anywhere I don’t think. We’ve spent too long pandering to people and allowing things to be dragged out so yet again our country will be damaged by a combination of indecision, NIMBYism, pseudo-environmentalism and a healthy dose of stupidity.

[Swervin_Mervin]

djc206 said:

saaby93 said:

ok it was a first guess
Where do the other 2/3rds want to go?
Is upper Heyford about the right size and in the right place for transport links to get something going relatively quickly

If the political will exists Heathrow would be the right place to get something going quickly.

No it wouldn't. The planning process alone will take the best part of a decade, then there'll need to be the orders process to secure the land which will take another chunk of years and thats before a spade goes in the ground. There's then the small matter of the enormous civil engineering project to undertake. I reckon it's a project that will take well over 20yrs, possibly even 30, even with a good wind.

I still dont reckon it will happen at all. If Gatwick press ahead with plans that could kill it dead

[captain_cynic]

Swervin_Mervin said:

http://mantp.co.uk

T1 will go. T2 massively expanded. T3 expanded and linked to new super terminal. Host of other improvements.

Current pass numbers of c28mppa with capacity following expansion to 50mppa.

Add in Gatwick expansion and you have much more cost effective solution.

That said i appreciate it isnt that simple and we won't know for some time what an expanded MAN is capable of attracting. Gatwick should just wang an application in for 2nd runway and terminal expansion. Could he delivered much more quickly than the Heathrow expansion, which isnt going to happen anytime soon

The problem with Manchester and Gatwick is that they would require airlines to set up operations in another place when they've already go their operations set up in Heathrow.

I've mentioned Gatwick is a non-starter because it's geared towards short haul flights, long haul flights have different requirements that would necessitate the complete reorganisation of logistics and passenger processing. Manchester would be slightly better in terms of passenger processing, but too far out of the way for most people. It doesn't make sense for a northern airport to service the south of England. If I had to fly to Australia next week and couldn't get into LHR, I'd be better off going to Paris CDG than taking a train north.

Expanding Heathrow is the best option because no other airport in the UK is realistically set up to take any traffic off it (otherwise it would have done so already).

[djc206]

Swervin_Mervin said:

No it wouldn't. The planning process alone will take the best part of a decade, then there'll need to be the orders process to secure the land which will take another chunk of years and thats before a spade goes in the ground. There's then the small matter of the enormous civil engineering project to undertake. I reckon it's a project that will take well over 20yrs, possibly even 30, even with a good wind.

I still dont reckon it will happen at all. If Gatwick press ahead with plans that could kill it dead

I’m hopeful it will happen but I have my doubts. I don’t see why Gatwick getting another runway would negate the need for Heathrow to build one, traffic is growing rapidly and building one runway isn’t going to be enough. It’s like the old motorway widening projects, add a lane at great expense and then a decade later find yourself needing another by which time the cost has grown even more. Just build them both now.

[captain_cynic]

Swervin_Mervin said:

djc206 said:

saaby93 said:

ok it was a first guess
Where do the other 2/3rds want to go?
Is upper Heyford about the right size and in the right place for transport links to get something going relatively quickly

If the political will exists Heathrow would be the right place to get something going quickly.

No it won't. The planning process alone will take the best part of a decade, then there'll need to be the orders process to secure the land which will take another chunk of years and thats before a spare hoes in the ground. There's then the small matter of the enormous civil engineering project to undertake. I reckon it's a project that will take well over 20yrs even with a good wind.

I still dont reckon it will happen at all. If Gatwick press ahead with plans that could kill it dead

What makes you think Gatwick would be any faster? Same NIMBY's, maybe a bit less council but expanding Gatwick still requires demolishing a village or two.

If any construction will be done quickly, it'll be at Heathrow because they'll have the backing of a lot of businesses.

[jammy-git]

captain_cynic said:

I've mentioned Gatwick is a non-starter because it's geared towards short haul flights, long haul flights have different requirements that would necessitate the complete reorganisation of logistics and passenger processing. Manchester would be slightly better in terms of passenger processing, but too far out of the way for most people. It doesn't make sense for a northern airport to service the south of England. If I had to fly to Australia next week and couldn't get into LHR, I'd be better off going to Paris CDG than taking a train north.

Expanding Heathrow is the best option because no other airport in the UK is realistically set up to take any traffic off it (otherwise it would have done so already).

What's the difference between in logistics and passenger processing between short haul and long haul?

To a layman like myself it just seems like you check in bags, have your passport checked and get on a plane, regardless of how far it's going?

[captain_cynic]

jammy-git said:

What's the difference between in logistics and passenger processing between short haul and long haul?

To a layman like myself it just seems like you check in bags, have your passport checked and get on a plane, regardless of how far it's going?

Not a lot of diff for the front end, like you said, check you bags, have your passport scanned et al...

At the back end, there's a world of difference. Long haul flights are typically widebodies, so they take longer to load and unload, require more services (a narrow body may require one or two baggage tugs, a widebody will require 3 or more, also large airports like LHR have two crews working both sides of the plane for big aircraft) and have a longer turn around between flights, its not uncommon for an B747/A380 to be sitting on the tarmac for hours before returning. Cabins will be cleaned, aircraft inspected if needed, food and other consumables will need to be prepared and loaded (some of that preparation begins six hours before departure).

Customs areas need to be larger and better staffed to handle a greater volume of passengers (and Gatwick is terrible for this already). Same with baggage collection and check in.

LCC's (Low Cost Carriers) which dominate Gatwick and Luton operate on a quick turnaround model, get the plane in, passengers off, do the minimum you need to before getting new passengers on and back in the air. Cleaning and non vital inspections will be postponed until the aircraft is back at base unless absolutely necessary. A full service airline will often have their equipment (erm... the plane) moved to a holding area on the tarmac whilst its being cleaned and only moved to a gate when it's time for resupply (then boarding) which increases traffic even though the aircraft are not taking off.

Long haul inevitably means larger aircraft, larger aircraft mean more wake turbulence which increases the time the next aircraft must wait before it can safely take off.

[jammy-git]

Isn't it a risk then to only have one airport in the UK that is really set up for long haul? Wouldn't it be better to have two with that capability?

[dcb]

captain_cynic said:

It doesn't make sense for a northern airport to service the south of England.

Bit arrogant, surely ? Do you think all those folks in the Midlands and the
North like going to LHR ?

So why does it make sense for a Southern airport, in one of the most congested
and expensive parts of the UK, to service all the UK ?

It would be better off in the Midlands or the North. Any Time and Motion person
will tell you that. Manchester airport could be expanded. One of the RAF bases
in Oxfordshire could be repurposed. A completely new airport could be built
to modern standards with room for expansion.

[oyster]

dcb said:

oyster said:

How will all your regional airports sustain flights to/from China, Brazil, Indonesia, USA etc?

However they want.

Is that all you've got?

The fact is they won't be sustainable.
Post-Brexit we need to embrace world trade - for that we need to be able to transport the traders from the UK to wherever they're going to be trading with and vice-versa.

You can't split the flights across regions - it wouldn't be sustainable for the airlines. And do you really think Doncaster can support a daily flight to Beijing?

[captain_cynic]

dcb said:

Bit arrogant, surely ? Do you think all those folks in the Midlands and the
North like going to LHR ?

How so?

Is it arrogant to want to be able to use the most convenient airport to me?

Lets use this scenario. Say I suddenly have to fly to Australia next week. So I go to my go-to airline, Singapore but they say because of artificial traffic limitations I cant use my closest airport, LHR, Singapore airlines has said I need to go to Manchester. But that's 4 hours on the train and Manchester isn't served by Singapore Airlines, I'll need to board a Lufthansa plane to Frankfurt and then change to SQ...

Or I can take a 4 hour train to Paris CDG, get straight on a Singapore Airlines A380 and not have to stress about changing planes in Frankfurt nor squeeze into a Luftwaffe seat nor travel hundreds of miles in the wrong direction.

Or maybe, just maybe I could get the flight from London Heathrow... But that's arrogant apparently.

An airport in the North is in the wrong direction for most travellers (for the few who it isn't, Manchester is already an option... but so are Luton and Stanstead which are far closer). That is why it doesn't make sense.

dcb said:

So why does it make sense for a Southern airport, in one of the most congested
and expensive parts of the UK, to service all the UK ?

I've explained this in several posts... I'm not repeating myself again because you cant get it.

dcb said:

It would be better off in the Midlands or the North. Any Time and Motion person
will tell you that. Manchester airport could be expanded. One of the RAF bases
in Oxfordshire could be repurposed. A completely new airport could be built
to modern standards with room for expansion.

How?

We've covered all of this before. There are no other airports in the UK like Heathrow and it will be far more expensive and pointless to try and make a new one in the middle of nowhere than to expand Heathrow. This is why the Thames Estuary Airport has never come to fruition and it makes a lot more sense to build a new airport in Kent than to build one in Manchester.

I'm beginning to think you just hate Heathrow for some irrational reason. In which case, you can just get over it.

[DanL]

dcb said:

captain_cynic said:

It doesn't make sense for a northern airport to service the south of England.

Bit arrogant, surely ? Do you think all those folks in the Midlands and the
North like going to LHR ?

Don't they already use Manchester or Birmingham airports? not trolling (at least not intentionally!) - I just don't know where you can / can't go from these airports, but surely they can't just service UK and Europe?