WOW ... Looks like I've stirred the entire
Heathrow Appreciation Society into action en masse! Could it be that the truth hurts?
All those questions ... the hour is late, but I'll have a go.
Actually Shed, STN only accounts for <9% of UK trade.
That is a very respectable total for one gateway alone. Especially one which is not centrally located within the UK. And it is growing too.
was expecting a binary answer: a simple yes/no.
OOPS! You should have said! ;-)
worth up to £102 billlion to the UK economy with the West Midlands benefiting by £1 billion, the north east by £200 million, and Scotland £170 million by the creation of new jobs
Dear, oh dear! Are these numbers supposed to enthuse the regions and justify yet more massively imbalanced investment in the SE alone? Just do the maths here. Even if that £102Bn number is in any way credible, the W Mids windfall is just under 1%, the NE share is shy of 0.2%, Scotland scores around the 0.15% mark. It appears that these numbers demonstrate my point, not yours. Talk about crumbs from the rich man's table!
do you think that taxes raised in London should be spent in Manchester?
Many corporate entities which derive profits nationwide and globally declare profits from a London HQ address. Should these taxes 'raised in London' be spent on Londoners alone? Besides, to attribute taxes raised by district would be a futile and pointless endeavour.
do you think that taxes raised in the south should be spent in the south
See the answer above.
do you think that HS2 should be scrapped and the money spent on upgrading and duplicating existing track and sorting out bottlenecks?
HS2 is an extremely complex topic. I follow the debate with great interest on the rail forum of the skyscrapercity website. Best not open this can of worms on the PPRuNe LHR thread!
do you agree with me that high speed rail priority (if we have to have it) should be a Liverpool-Manchester-Leeds route?
Another debate for skyscraper really. But the main issue on this route is capacity rather than line-speed. The best outcome would be to double up the route to four tracks (two fast, two slow) all the way to the junction with the ECML. (Much) longer trains are essential too. Travel distances between the various major centres of population clustered along this route are too short to enable a conventional high-speed model to work.
do you think that a "do nothing" policy at Heathrow is the right one?
Ideally not, but whatever we do
must make good sense from a financial perspective. This is where the R3 proposals fall down. They are wildly over-priced. I support measures which can enhance the functionality of LHR on a cost-effective basis.
AMS ... The sheer volume of trade and commerce is impressive and is exactly what we need to encourage to live within our means and pay pur debts down.
This stuff about the phenomenal success of AMS as a freight hub merits further examination. Do you believe that if LHR was unconstrained those freighters would be choosing London instead? Is London well placed for distributing arriving / departing air freight not only across Benelux, but rapidly into Rhine / Ruhr and the heart of Europe beyond? AMS offers this; London is located on an island. Slot scarcity on London's runways is not the reason for Amsterdam's success in handling air freight.
the commision has spoken and we need to move forward.
If the sums add up. Some very well-informed experts are warning us that they don't. Including the CEO of LHR's largest airline customer.
we need to move forward with putting capacity in where it's needed.
Within the confines of fiscal responsibility. But not regardless of cost.
You guys are fighting a fight simply on a North/South political view
We are fighting on the grounds of cost. Particularly those multiple billions which will be required from public funds which can be allocated one-time only.
screwing over LHR expansion won't help MAN.
Skipness, really. We know that you are an intelligent, well-informed professional. Lashing out in tantrum-mode does you no credit. You are better than that.
Firstly, as you know, I have
never argued against LHR expansion on the misapprehension that MAN would benefit from displaced SE demand. All my archived postings on the topic bear witness to this. I have argued clearly and consistently that MAN is a solution for air travel in the North, not a viable conduit for SE-originating business. And you know that I have always argued this. The only reason I mention MAN at all in this debate is in direct response to your insistence on inserting innuendo-heavy references to that particular airport at every opportunity.
And I do not argue for "screwing over" anybody. In fact, over the last three decades it is very much the regions which have been "screwed over" whilst the SE has soaked up an obscene proportion of public infrastructure funding at the expense of everywhere else. Rebalancing of this anomaly is long overdue.
My objection to LHR R3 is clearly outlined in my earlier post, No. 3662 on this thread. The wildly excessive cost is the issue, not an inherent desire to inhibit LHR. The price-tag for any expansion project, no matter how desirable, has to make sense financially.