CARDIFF - 2

[MerchantVenturer]

CWL as international hub

I've read through the newspaper report more than once and the proposal is so light on detail as to be irrelevant at this stage. There is talk about a more detailed submission in due course but do the proponents already have a sort of 'back of fag packet' idea that they hope to translate into an arguable case?

There so many imponderables anyway. The road and rail infrastructure would clearly have to come from the public purse and the Severn Barrage is so controversial and comes in many versions that there is no certainty it will ever be built or, if it is, whether the design will allow road or rail passage across it.

But who is to foot the bill for what would be an immense sum to transform CWL into a major gateway airport? The current owners seem reluctant to do more than apply the odd lick of paint.

Is this something else the scheme supporters hope will come largely from public funding or do they they themselves intend to try to gain control of the airport and invest a huge amount of their own money?

Even if all the funding could be found and all the connecting and airport infrastructure built I'm still not sure what a Western Gateway means. Is it primarily intended for travellers to and from the south-west corner of Great Britain or as a full-blown alternative to Heathrow?

If the former, as TwinAisle (a man who knows a thing or two about airlines and airports from first-hand experience over many years) points out, a gateway aimed primarily at south-west Britain would not provide the numbers of passengers for even an emasculated LHR-type operation, and just a few long-haul flights would still send the majority of travellers to LHR of necessity.

If the idea is to be a sort of Heathrow overflow the suggestion made in another post that reverse principle applies is difficult to sustain. CAA and other surveys show that somewhere between 70% and 80% of LHR (and LGW for that matter) passengers originate or terminate in the South East. A tiny fraction of this figure does so in south-west Britain. This means that many, many more travellers would have to make their way from a CWL gateway to the South East than currently do so from LHR/LGW to the South West/South Wales.

In any case, if a major, or at least an important, gateway is needed away from the South East then Birmingham Airport seems the obvious contender. It's already an option for South Wales/South West travellers and it possesses rail and pretty decent road connectivity with a runway that's being lengthened and, according to its CEO, the ability to immediately double its current 9 mppa.

I really do find it hard to take the group's proposal seriously at this point though I do look forward to studying their worked-up, business case when it reaches the public domain.