Former CEO Bob Ayling condems 3rd runway

Old May 5, 2008, 3:39 am
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Former CEO Bob Ayling condems 3rd runway

See article in The Times

Here's an extract frfom the begining

A third runway at Heathrow is against Britain’s economic interests. It is being driven by BAA, the Spanish-owned airport operator, and the misguided aspirations of British airlines. It is likely, in the long term, to prove a costly mistake.

The government’s “economic case” presented in the white paper is fairly clear - it wants to create a global “hub and spoke” network centred on Heathrow to compete with rivals on the continent. It envisages a huge passenger interchange.

This is a classic exercise in misguided central planning. What Ruth Kelly, the transport secretary, and the government do not see is that the transfer passengers, for whom such a hub would be built, spend no money in Britain, at least little beyond the price of a cup of tea, and Heathrow as an interchange is already so far behind its rivals that it is out of the game.


The article goes on to say that connecting passengers are loss making, hubs are not the way forward (since low-cost airlines are so much more successful) & that expansion of Heathrow won't be used by the Brits but by passengers passing though & contributing to the UK Economy "little beyond the price of a cup of tea".

There are some obvious contradictions here. I guess Bob Ayling knows BA inside out, but he left the company in 2000 (?) so how will he know if today's connecting traffic is losing them money? The BA network if built first & foremost around London's O&D demand & the connections are simply scheduled in. Take India for example:- The flights arrive & depart places such as Bangalore at some ungodly hour in order to meet connections to destinations such as SFO. If connections didn't matter, then surely a later schedule would be flown? Low cost airlines don't hub, but have bases where they concentrate operations - everything like a hub, but they don't encourage interlining. The Times also goes on to say that hub operations have contributed to the bankruptcy of almost every major US airline. Well without hubs, what would they do? The US simply doesn't have the population density to support mass scale point-to-point routes. How would one fly Anchorage-Tampa? Furthermore, connecting passengers contribute money to the UK economy through landing fees, airline tickets & assosiated costs - however, since BAA is spanish owned.
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Old May 5, 2008, 4:54 am
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Originally Posted by flyboy777
See article in The Times


There are some obvious contradictions here. I guess Bob Ayling knows BA inside out, but he left the company in 2000 (?) so how will he know if today's connecting traffic is losing them money?
If Ayling was still running BA I might pay some attention but ISTR that he was easily led by Marketing (tail fins) and tended to follow the latest trend of the chattering classes!
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Old May 5, 2008, 5:21 am
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It's actually quite an interesting argument...

Is the expansion necessary for the development of the South East and UK economy, or is it required to provide the ability for airlines such as BA, Virgin, BMI and the various alliances based at Heathor to feed each other more traffic. The statistics on the number of people who get off at Heathrow or transit to another UK destination would be useful as that would lend weight (or not) to Ayling's argument.

I've no doubt that the argument is a complex one, and I'd certainly like to see the airports in the South East developed or replaced and a more reliable and useful infrastructure put in place (in fact this might be the best use of public money in terms of investment in the next 10-20 years). I would argue that it's better to ensure that what we've got is used and maintained better than it currently is whilst planning for the future.

I can't help thinking that Dubai (and Hong Kong and a few others) have all had the right idea in building their newer airports in new locations. Sure, the environmental impact needs to be detremined and analysed, but if the answer is that we need another runway, but perhaps Heathrow is not the place to put it?

(Here we go again!)
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Old May 5, 2008, 7:10 am
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Originally Posted by jakesterUK
I can't help thinking that Dubai (and Hong Kong and a few others) have all had the right idea in building their newer airports in new locations
Where exactly is the new airport at Dubai jake?
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Old May 5, 2008, 7:25 am
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Originally Posted by kepiblanc
Where exactly is the new airport at Dubai jake?
Currently being built at Jebel Ali, about 40Km from DXB.

Cheers,
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Old May 5, 2008, 7:59 am
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I love the way he blames the government. The huge response from the SERAS consultation exercise was that the airlines did not want to be moved from LHR at all - nor have to operate across two or three London airports.

He seems to have forgotten that it was the airlines which asked for expansion at LHR
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Old May 5, 2008, 8:34 am
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Originally Posted by jakesterUK
I can't help thinking that Dubai (and Hong Kong and a few others) have all had the right idea in building their newer airports in new locations. Sure, the environmental impact needs to be detremined and analysed, but if the answer is that we need another runway, but perhaps Heathrow is not the place to put it?
In the 2003 Government White Paper, they said that they'd only go down that road after all other options had been exhausted. Still, another runaway at Heathrow is hardly a long term solution.

I beleive the last resort 'mega-airport' would be built on the Thames Estuary. Aircraft approaches wouldn't be over the middle of london, there would be plenty of space to expand. It hasn't been meantioned in the press recently since Heathrow's being getting a lot of the attention.
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Old May 5, 2008, 9:34 am
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I was surprised to see that Boris is against a third runway too. I myself was previously for it, but it shows what a little research and an open mind can do as I'm now pretty much against it. LHR is poorly situated, surrounded by houses and motorways. If expansion is needed (which it probably is, long term) then LGW or STN should get a second runway as a much higher priority (along with breaking up the BAA monopoly) than a third runway at LHR.

What BA/LHR actually need is more efficient use of the existing runways. Mixed mode is the obvious initial step. Bigger planes is the second (and fully airline controlled). With Terminal 5 and Terminal East LHR will have sufficient terminal capacity going forward, it's the runway capacity that's already maxed out. BA should forget the "big twin" idea and concentrate on getting more A380's IMHO as I really can't see a third runway being built any time soon.
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Old May 5, 2008, 10:35 am
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Originally Posted by kepiblanc
Where exactly is the new airport at Dubai jake?
As DYKWIA says (Heathrow T5 on acid - it's absolutely enormous!)...

Some links...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:D...2_Imresolt.jpg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:D...1_Imresolt.jpg

The airport site as is today: -

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=e...5&iwloc=C&om=1

I didn't think it was opening until 2020, but 2017 appears to be what Wikipedia thinks it will be...
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Old May 5, 2008, 2:41 pm
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Originally Posted by flyboy777

I beleive the last resort 'mega-airport' would be built on the Thames Estuary. Aircraft approaches wouldn't be over the middle of london, there
They would when the wind is blowing from east to west, which I believe is about 30% of the time.
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Old May 5, 2008, 3:03 pm
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Lydd - Ashford International...

Build a connecting branch of the high-speed railway to connect it to Ashford International Station, no real problems with urban area in terms of expanding runway(s), just a few birds and marshland.

Often wondered why it has not been pushed through before now.
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Old May 5, 2008, 4:01 pm
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I think airlines (as well as their customers) are being unreasonable. LHR must be constrained, and expansion forced onto other airports. What's the cost of a 3rd LHR runway? Bet this money would go very far towards building a Skytrain and new terminal at LTN, a fast rail connection to Manston and/or a second runway at LGW.
OTOH, the suggestion that transit pax don't help the economy of a country is beyond bizarre. Don't these people pay for their air tickets, baggage handling, use of immigration facilities and therefore help keep locals employed? I suppose such a deep level of understanding is not required to run an airline...
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Old May 5, 2008, 8:31 pm
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This is interesting to read. I thought everyone would be pro the 3rd runway.
I myself am completely against a 3rd runway, purely for personal reasons as I live in the village of Sipson which will wiped off the map. Literally, it will be gone if a 3rd runway is built. I think the only parties who will benefit will be BAA and the airlines. They want everyone who works at Heathrow to think their job is at risk if a 3rd runway doesn't happen. Well Amsterdam and Paris have had their "extra" runways for a while now and LHR isn't exactly a ghost town. If these companies wanted to benefit the public/passenger, there would be less shops, more security gates, all aircraft would arrive on stands, (there should be no buses on arrival in 2008!!), wheelchair passengers wouldn't have to wait nearly an hour for their wheelchairs so they can get off the aircraft.

We're talking about the demolition of 700 ( so BAA say, could be well over 1000) homes, could be 2500 residents needing to find somewhere else to live, all for a few companies to make money.

Half of Harlington, gone.Half of Harmondsworth, gone.Longford, pretty much surrounded by LHR... Forgive me for sounding angry, but they are scaring people into backing it. I think in an ideal world LHR should be razed to the ground and started again..

Best wishes to all....
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Old May 6, 2008, 2:54 am
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Originally Posted by flygirl68
This is interesting to read. I thought everyone would be pro the 3rd runway.
I think there's a huge number of people who are against the third runway: the 2 million London residents who live under the current flightpaths, for a start.
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Old May 6, 2008, 3:38 am
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Ayling is wrong in quite a few respects here.

A large number of transfer pax require a large number of flights to shift them through the hub.

This large number of flights translates into a large number of daily frequencies to key destinations - JFK being the ultimate example.

It's this choice of frequencies that makes LHR such an attractive O&D location for business. However, the business traffic would not on its own justify so many frequencies without switching to smaller aircraft.

Basically - you can't have your cake and eat it!
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