This thread is a graphic demonstration of why we in the UK are just so hopeless at major projects and decisions. As one poster pointed out for all its faults LHR is the destination of choice and for some very good reasons, ground and air connectivity.
It has been a big airport for all my lifetime,I am 60, and I grew up next to it when ublike the 777s and A380s off today, there really was such a thing as aircraft noise, try a PW powered 707 fan jet on approach screaming like the banshees of hell. Or that otherwise lovely but dreadfully un-neighbourly craft, the VC 10, which shook building foundations on take off-no reduced thrust departures back then. So people living relatively nearby-let’s say a 10km circle have all moved their or grown up their knowing there was a massive airport close by. Many of them liked it because it gave those good jobs and many more because it was easy to get to and from.
Others may have notices the huge empty space just north of the ‘field’ where the LON VOR sits and wondered or deduced why it hadn’t become a housing estate in that time period.
Flying over Queenies house is actually a good thing since Windsor Great part has no population and a couple of immense open spaces where a dist4ess airline could attempt a desperation landing –or aim just to the north for the runway like Olympic rowing park which would be a perfect runway in distress.
So as everyone want to use it leave it where it is , even the lovies from Kew and Richmond who have the most influence if not the most sense will flip from environmentally (and house price) related opposition once they realise how far the alternatives are along with the £100 each way train fare to Boris island.
So in essence just get on and build R3 north of the airport as shown, no one lives in Sipson except transient airline staff and for any longer term residents just give them a fair compulsory purchase settlement, as opposed to the normal parsimony shown by the Government in these circumstances.
I could go on, transition to Boris Island-how long would that take, six months, a year, longer-perfect for a hub.
80, 000 jobs gone in West London, Surrey and Berks, if you live in say Camberley or Chalfont St G even if you are long haul crew Boris Island is just too damn far, for the army of skilled airline specialists are they all going to move ?? What is going to happen when it’s gone, houses?? Sure , that’s easy just get rid of the three fuel depots and the 100 square Km of 6-10 foot think reinforced concrete in the ramps runways and taxiways and it will be a delightful tree less and features desert.
So it has to be LHR . love it or hate it, just get on and build the bloody thing before we are eclipsed completely by FRA CDG AMS DXB IST and become a peripheral player in civil aviation just like we are in most every other field of commerce except finance and gambling and they are much the same thing today right?