I have followed Luton’s progress for well over 40 years. I have worked in the terminal when there was more staff on duty than passengers and when Luton still used additional grass runways for the light aircraft. Most of that time I was frustrated that Luton had peaked at around 3.3 million passengers in I think 1973 but after Court went bust always seemed to hover around the 1.8 million mark as I wanted more.
In 1999 the new terminal opened when from memory the passenger figure was around 5 million and all was fine in my world. There was still long gaps between departures and for much of the time there was no airport related noise so there was a balance. I can’t really say when that balance changed but the airport is now intrusive and affects more and more lives.
The physical changes in the last 5 years have been incredible. Stand inside the CTA and only the control tower and the hangar seemed to have remained untouched. The rest of the area is completely unrecognisable. New road layouts, bus station, terminal front, pier, drop off zone, 2 multi-storey car parks and a station under construction have all left the airport looking completely different.
From my point of view enough is enough. A line has to be drawn in the sand where future expansion outside the airports existing boundary is unacceptable.