It's noticeable that all the dissenting voices are from the "regions" or er....Thailand. Heathrow has already lost a lot of connectivity already, AMS still has the growing connections and the room to expand. A lot of the posters on here seem to have a grudge against the more prosperous South East and an axe to grind. Don't tell me otherwise, I am a Scot and I grew up surrounded by numpties that blamed the English for everything wrong in Scotland. It's pretty familiar.
It's typically Britsh to run down what ought to be a fundamentally important hub airport. An airline ( lets call them BA ) pulled out of my local airport to concentrate on LHR therefore I hate Heathrow and want it to suffer. BAA ? Hate them too? British jobs? Nah they're in the South East and I'm not so I don't care. Hey let's encourage everyone to use AMS / CDG / FRA cos BA doesn't fly from MAN-JFK anymore.
That's the British way, and we won't realise it until we've f***ed it up like we do everything else these days.
M4 corridor? Use Farnborough then.
THAT's the level of debate.