Originally Posted by DubTrub
Harks back to the silly Airport designators in this country too...I was trying to remember that NX is East Midlands and BB is Birmingham...but wtf is Luton GW and Gatwick not GW?
At least Stansted is SS.
All the above written as a vanilla PPL...
The Location Indicators in the UK were originally very logical. After the EG to indicate the UK region, a double letter (SS, LL, CC etc) would indicate a Communications Centre (ComCen) located at a major airport. Smaller aereodromes in the same general vicinity would have the same third letter and a unique fourth letter. Therefore, in ATC, even if you did not immediately know the name, you would have an indication of roughly where it was located. Many of these still survive, but with others the system has gone to pot, particularly with the EGT series which are scattered everywhere. Many other States have more user friendly systems, particularly the US which has the luxury of having the second, third and fourth letters available to represent the location in abbreviated form.