Prestwick-2

[tartan 201]

Originally Posted by Albert Hall

Is this where AGS buy it, shut the terminal building and run it as a freight, tech stop and maintenance airport business park for which GLA doesn’t have room? I’d think that is probably one of few answers which gives proper sustainability.

Originally Posted by Mister Geezer

I suspect the area where the terminal is could be prime real estate for housing if the airport railway station could be transferred for ScotRail to manage and they keep it operating. There are few new housing developments that have a railway station within walking distance. The airport car park that is just south of the railway station would make a fantastic 'park and ride' facility for those wishing to park their car and use the train. A commuters dream perhaps!

Originally Posted by Skipness One Foxtrot

I can see no way towards profitability on passenger ops, none whatsoever.
If GLA is struggling somewhat, and it is, there is no route towards PIK making money in that space.
Cut costs, demolish the terminal, flog off the land and reinvest in core non passenger services. You could literally sell apron A and B for housing and plant trees. It's not beyond the wit of man to move the cargo sheds.

I’m not sure it’s quite that simple. Demolishing the terminal could be relatively costly. It was built in the 1960s and so its construction predates modern standards. This document, for example, refers to the removal of asbestos in a recent refurbishment of the terminal building - there may be other locations in the terminal where demolition costs may be abnormally high. Parts of the terminal and the old cargo sheds on the western side of Apron A are let to non-aviation businesses and generate income. So demolishing things just to save costs might end up having a fairly high upfront cost and reduce income.

However, if the terminal was demolished with the aim of turning aprons A and B into housing development money would have to be spent on other things. If I recall correctly, aprons A and B were served by an underground hydrant refuelling system fed by the fuel tanks to the west of Apron A (visible at the top left on the photo below). Assuming that's still there, that system would likely have to be removed and the land remediated before any housing development could start - again that may be costly given it dates from the 60s. Would the cargo sheds on the eastern side of Apron B need to be relocated, which would again involve a cost?

https://goo.gl/maps/5EUrkrjvywhyr3ZM7

I would have thought that few property developers are likely to want to take on the risk of dealing with the above. They may likely expect any new owner to undertake such work and handover to the developer a remediated site that could then be built upon. Assuming they did that though, there could then be other issues that come into play.

Assuming the parallel taxiway remains past aprons A and B (and it would be short-sighted to remove it), any development of housing may need a significant stand-off distance from the taxiway and from the fuel farm. So there may be significant chunks of aprons A and B that couldn’t be built upon. The Pow Burn to the east has flooded in the past and money may have to be spent remediating that.

Let’s assume, however, that all the above are addressed and a developer wishes to submit a planning application to South Ayrshire Council for houses. Among other things, SAC may want to be convinced that a housing development represented a logical extension of Prestwick and residents could easily access local facilities. If you look at an aerial photograph of the area, housing there could be considered isolated from the rest of Prestwick - it would be around a 20-minute walk to the nearest primary school for example, so the council may not be convinced of the planning case for some houses on the current terminal site.

Any deal with, for example, a housing developer could likely be contingent on the developer buying the land only when they get planning consent. So the terminal could be closed (with income lost), the land remediated (money spent) but no income gained from a sale if no planning consent was forthcoming.

Assuming that planning consent for housing was gained, there’s then the matter of selling the houses. Some of these would front onto a busy dual-carriageway (the A79), others on to the fuel farm and others onto a live taxiway. All of them would be near a 24hr operational airport with the noise that that entails. Such houses may sell for less compared to others in the area.

So any housing development may have to spend more than average to make the site suitable yet may command prices less than average given the characteristics of the site. Data from the Scottish Government (here) shows that there were 144 houses built for private sale in South Ayrshire in 2018, down from around 200 - 300 a year prior to the recession. Perhaps demand for housing in the area isn't as buoyant as some think and may not be able to absorb the costs of dealing with the above? Housing developers would also have a choice of other potential development sites elsewhere in Ayrshire, which likely wouldn't have the same extent of issues (including political) as building on the terminal site would - the airport site isn't the only potential housing development site in the area and demand doesn't appear to be such that developers are falling over themselves to build houses.

That said, there are parts of the airport estate that could make sense for housing development and could avoid the issues above. The former HMS Gannet may be considered suitable for housing - there is a live planning application for houses immediately to the west of it and the airport themselves obviously saw some development potential on the HMSG land as they submitted a Proposal of Application notice to SAC for potential development on that land, but no application was forthcoming.

Also, the southern part of 03/21 could perhaps form a logical eastwards extension of housing in Prestwick. However, there is a golf course between there and the existing housing (see below) which might need to be included in any development to stitch the new housing into the existing. More expense though.

https://goo.gl/maps/uFeaHYhRNQWj4cFr5

If a new owner closed the terminal, then they may have to deal with some potential political flak given the loss of employment at the terminal. If the terminal closed, then there would presumably also be a question mark over the future of the Ryanair hangars and their associated jobs, since Ryanair would have to position the aircraft in empty from other airports.

Any flak the new owners got for losing jobs would presumably spread to the Scottish Government. There may well be a Westminster election this coming autumn, at around the time any new owners could take over, so the SNP may be nervous about any new owner announcing plans that could have a negative effect on employment at a politically-sensitive time. They could perhaps get round that by including a condition in the sale that passenger operations should be continued for 'x' years (perhaps until after the 2021 Holyrood elections).

I could just about see the logic of AGS buying it and relocating Ryanair to Glasgow as they could offer some new jobs at Glasgow for affected staff and it may be palatable for Ryanair to position aircraft between Glasgow and Prestwick for maintenance. However, AGS could have done that at any point since Infratil started seeking offers and they haven’t so why would they suddenly want to do it now? Perhaps the loss of Ryanair at Glasgow has made the airport management there think again? Equally, Ryanair could have decided to relocate all their Prestwick operations to Glasgow at any time but hitherto haven't - perhaps they like the negotiating leverage of keeping Prestwick's terminal open?

Edinburgh airport could make a similar case for buying it and relocating Ryanair’s aircraft there. However, Ryanair's Edinburgh base grew to nine aircraft in spring this year but seems to have reduced back to eight in June with the reduction in the Stansted flights. So it’s not obvious that there’s a demand, at least in the short term, to relocate Ryanair’s Prestwick-based aircraft to Edinburgh.

Would either AGS or Edinburgh airport really want to deal with the issues mentioned above to reclaim some of their outlay?

This article states that several expressions of interest have been received and that the preferred bidder should be known by early September, so not long until everything I've written above is no doubt proven wrong.