Cynical ploy?
Whether a cynical ploy to enhance the perceived value of the airport overnight or not, the owners of ‘London Oxford Airport’ sure have gained a staggering amount of publicity in the last 24 hours – all presumably for free. Almost every national newspaper has covered the story and numerous websites, the BBC, ITV even CNBC!
I suspect there’s a lot more to this name change than meets the eye. Think long, long term – secure that name and when someone converts say Upper Heyford, RAF Brize Norton or RAF Benson into a major international hub instead of that daft idea for another airport in the Thames estuary (anyone heard of bird-strike risks?), you close down Kidlington and hey-presto, you’ve got the brand name of potentialy one of the world’s largest international hubs. High speed rail link like the Shanghai monorail into Marleybone or north-west London somewhere and you are 25-30 minutes away from central London.
This isn’t about Oxford/Kidlington Airport, that said, there’s no reason why they can’t have say 20+ Q400 flights a day out of there to a number of European destinations tomorrow. I’d drive past Heathrow to fly from a hassle-free regional airport any day - outside the London TMA too, no delays.
Thinking about it, I bet it’s got something to do with scuppering Farnborough’s bid to increase their capacity limit – why on earth allow Farnborough a 70% increase when ‘London Oxford’s’ got unlimited capacity??