Lets not get carried away about short term expansion. The fact is that the airports policy not to spend money on new facilities until the need is there has caught them out big time.
Phase 1 planning applications should have gone in 2 or 3 years ago. With planning permission gained they could have picked their moment to actually start the work which would no doubt have been last winter.
The fact is that there are no spare stands this year and there won’t be any spare stands next year if the application results in a public enquiry. How many potential new nights stoppers will Luton loose because of a lack of stands? There is also still no sign of the airport getting to grips with traffic congestion at peak times although £1million was set aside in the 2006 budget. Again this should have been sorted out by now. As for the terminal the introduction of 10 new check-in desks running at a right angle to the existing ones is a panic measure because they know that again it will be at least 2 years if not more before the terminal is expanded.