Originally Posted by
pabely
But much longer runways attracting bigger aircraft. Stand capacity as well, no room for more stands above what is planned. Currently LGW has 57 based airbuses!
A single runway should comfortably be able to support 250K movements per year, and the DfT forecasts agree. Luton already sees an average of more than 160 pax per Air Transport Movement, this could give a theoretical runway capacity of 40m. The overall trend will continue to see increasing size of aircraft and passengers per flight. Its the transition of the multi sector a day A319 type through to A321 that will make the most difference, not the one rotation per day wide bodies. Of course there would need to be other changes, taxiways, stands etc. as well as loss of the existing corporate activity at LTN (much of which is already planned and in some cases already happening). The further expansion of LTN, STN and LGW is all more likely than R3 at LHR. None of it is certain of course.
FF