MPT
I went to the MPT consultation at the Hilton hotel this evening. There were more detailed plans and I had some good conversations with staff there. I got the following info:
- Confirmed that the MPT will be in an underground tunnel from the Eastern edge of the medium term car park, under taxiway alpha, all the way into the CTA.
- The CTA station will be under the current drop off zone at a depth of c. 9 meters.
- Expectation that there will be still be a charge similar to current bus fare, but will promote through ticketing.
- In discussion with network rail, but hope to have the rail gate-line at the airport station, i.e. won't have to go through an intermediate gate-line when transferring from the MPT to Thameslink at the Parkway interchange.
- I was told the airport owners expect to put in a planning application for a second multi-storey car park in the CTA in the next 12 months.
- Airport intend to move the drop-off zone into the multi-storey car park (not sure if this will be the current one, or new one). Recognise a major complaint about the current drop off zone being exposed to the weather.
- Second, much wider pedestrian bridge at parkway station between platforms to link to the MPT station, with escalators planned from the platforms.
- Project to be constructed in a way to maintain dual-carriageway access to/from the airport at all times.
That's about as much as I can remember. One of the people I spoke to hoped that the slightly more detailed plans (ahead of the formal planning application) will be added to the website in due course.
Overall the plans seem pretty well considered. I didn't ask about the stupid gateway bridge design, which I assume is just an architect having some fun.