Originally Posted by
binman
There is a highly complex stand planning process but I don't see any sign of it being used as it once was. In particular it is difficult to justify the number of coaching arrivals and departures when the entire 747 fleet has been scrapped and is no longer at LHR. One reason for this may be the need to stand park foreign operators like QR AA etc. This may have been a condition of them moving to T5 and their turnarounds may not fit with the BA model.
Still doesn't explain short haul arriving in B/C and so I suspect that may of the aircraft are indeed idle. It may be easier to park and bus that tow to and from the base. Could be staff shortages and those automated 1 man push back tractors probably don't do base tows.
It's hard to separate anecdotal evidence from cold, hard facts without having a full recap of the stand allocation & usage for the airport in the last few weeks and months, but... it's clear that there are differences. The short haul programme is a lot larger - at least comparatively - vs the long haul one and has been as such for a long while. There's a heap of LGW flights, plus a lot less longhaulers (think the Asian routes).
As a rule, also, BA tows to base only if the turnround time is exceeding 6 hours or thereabouts. Other airlines will only tow to a remote stand in the fuel farm ("T5D"), the only one that went all the way down to BA's base (which is owned by BA and not by HAL) was SAA which used to be charged north of £1m for that each year.
The Mototoks indeed don't have the oomph to do tows, and neither could do it since they need somebody to walk beside them.