2. If the government allows runway expansion, how will it be allocated around the country in an attempt to re-balance the economy ?
Why has this term emerged so much in recent years? When was the UK economy ever balanced in the first place? Why would attempts to distort the existing distortions be any more workable now than they have been in the past?
London is the only game in town. The argument is about expanding LHR v. a major overhaul at LGW and then somehow asking the airlines if they would kindly like to move. Or we go down the third fantasy option of an island airport.
The only people who really think that BHX can act as LHR's third runway are a group of ill-informed Midlands politicians who have no concept of how this industry works. To think that an airport which can't even serve its own local market is suddenly going to blossom into a major hub is just daft.
To think that BHX will become "just as easy as Heathrow" when a 38 minute high speed rail link, which may not even happen, is going to drop passengers onto yet another people mover to take them to the terminal, is even more daft. This will still make BHX further from London than all "London" airports, except perhaps for SEN. Yet the new line isn't even planned to start early enough in the day to connect with the first wave of departures, and it is certain to cost far more to use than any other airport "express" service.
So the only people that talk about "re-balancing" have to be very
unbalanced in their ability to analyse!