HEATHROW

[SeenItAll]

Full Info about CO LHR and LGW schedules

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/071115/lath105b.html?.v=1

Press Release Source: Continental Airlines

Continental Airlines to Launch Twice-Daily Nonstop Flights to Heathrow From Both New York and Houston
Thursday November 15, 5:30 am ET
Flights to commence March 29 next year

NEW YORK, Nov. 15 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Continental Airlines (NYSE: CAL - News), the world's fifth largest airline, today announced that it will launch nonstop flights to London/Heathrow from both its New York and Houston hubs on March 29, 2008, subject to government approval and slot approval.
Continental will offer twice-daily nonstop service to Heathrow from both Newark Liberty International Airport and Houston George Bush Intercontinental Airport. The airline will continue to offer nonstop flights to London/Gatwick from both New York (twice daily) and Houston (daily), as well as Cleveland (daily, seasonal).

"At last we will be able to give our customers something they have long requested -- the opportunity to fly to both London's main airports with their preferred airline," said Larry Kellner, Continental's chairman and CEO. "At the same time, we will be able to show transAtlantic travelers already using Heathrow what they have been missing. We look forward to the chance to compete at Europe's most important business airport."

Effective March 29, 2008, Continental's London schedule will be as follows (subject to approval). Continental will own each of the Heathrow arrival/departure slots necessary to operate this schedule:

To Heathrow

Origin Flight Departure Arrival Frequency Aircraft
no. type
New York
Liberty CO 18 9:00 a.m. 9:15 p.m. Daily 767-200ER
Houston CO 4 6:25 p.m. 9:35 a.m.* Daily 777
New York
Liberty CO 28** 6:40 p.m. 6:45 a.m.* Daily 777
Houston CO 32 10:25 p.m. 2:05 p.m.* Daily 767-200ER


From Heathrow

Destination Flight Departure Arrival Frequency Aircraft
no. type
Houston CO 33 8:30 a.m. 1:05 p.m. Daily 767-200ER
New York
Liberty CO 29 10:25 a.m. 1:15 p.m. Daily 777
Houston CO 5 11:15 a.m. 3:35 p.m. Daily 777
New York
Liberty CO 19 4:00 p.m. 7:15 p.m. Daily 767-200ER


To Gatwick

Origin Flight Departure Arrival Frequency Aircraft
no. type
Houston CO 34 4:00 p.m. 7:45 a.m.* Daily 767-400ER
New York
Liberty CO 114 6:35 p.m. 6:55 a.m.* Daily 757-200
Cleveland CO 66 7:20 p.m. 7:50 a.m.* Daily, 757-200
seasonal
New York
Liberty CO 116 8:25 p.m. 8:40 a.m.* Daily 757-200


From Gatwick

Destination Flight Departure Arrival Frequency Aircraft
no. type
Houston CO 35 9:30 a.m. 2:05 p.m. Daily 767-400ER
New York
Liberty CO 115 9:30 a.m. 1:05 p.m. Daily 757-200
Cleveland CO 67 11:20 a.m. 3:00 p.m. Daily, 757-200
seasonal
New York
Liberty CO 117 11:30 a.m. 2:55 p.m. Daily 757-200

* indicates next-day arrival
** For the period March 29, 2008-April 28, 2008 only, this flight will
depart New York Liberty at 7:25 p.m. and arrive Heathrow at 7:30 a.m.
the following day.


The new Heathrow flights have been made possible by the Open Skies agreement between the U.S. and the European Union signed earlier this year, and by Continental's acquisition of the necessary slots at Heathrow Airport. Until now, the airline has been prevented from operating to Heathrow by the restrictive U.S.-U.K. bilateral air services agreement. Continental has served Gatwick Airport since 1985.

Continental's Heathrow flights will be operated using two aircraft types: the 283-seat Boeing 777-200, carrying 48 passengers in the BusinessFirst cabin and 235 in coach, and the 174-seat Boeing 767-200ER, with 25 BusinessFirst seats and 149 coach seats. The airline's Gatwick flights will be operated using the 235-seat Boeing 767-400ER, with 35 BusinessFirst seats and 200 coach seats, and the 175-seat Boeing 757-200, carrying 16 passengers in the BusinessFirst cabin and 159 in coach.

Continental's Heathrow flights will operate at Terminal 4, which will be the future base for all SkyTeam carriers operating at the airport.

[KMG 365]

US Airways

US Airways announced daily A330 PHL-LHR service today. Flight arrives Heathrow at 11:05 and departs at 12:50. Start date is March 30.

[cjhants]

KMG - any news on who will do the handling?

[KMG 365]

Sorry, I don't know that, cjhants. I'd reckon whoever does United's handling would also work US Airways -- being Star Alliance partners and all that.

[HZ123]

I also earn my living at LHR and have done o for 35 years, I am also fortunate to fly as part of my employment. I live 4 miles from LHR. Peoples within 20 sq miles are effected by LHR and also the horrendeous 24/7 rackett from the M4 /25 and the many A roads. Just building another runway will achieve nothing as what is dire in the SE of the Uk is the transport infrastructure to service all 3 airports. Until the government deal with the real issues of transport no T5, second runways or T2 at STN will have any positive impact on UK air transport. LHR with t5 will still be the pits to travel from. Aviation is also the subject of continued terrorist threat, which actions have and can bring the airlines to financial ruin as has happened in the past and will do so again. Thus at some stage very soon the government must address the real issues.

[DarkStar]

Have to agree with HZ123 regarding the lack of decent infrastructure in place at LHR. The slip road leading from M25 to T5 is so poorly designed, it goes from a 5 line motorway to a dual carriage sliproad and then to a single lane leading to T5!!!!
Talk about building in traffic and congestion chaos before T5 has even opened and also the 'chatter' within Flt Ops is that allegedly the BAA have seriously miscalculated the number of passengers using T5 already.

Same old LHR......

[Artie Fufkin]

Third runway and new terminal for Heathrow

The BBC are reporting;

Transport Secretary Ruth Kelly has set out proposals for a third runway and a sixth terminal at Heathrow.

Announcing options for consultation, she said without growth the airport's status would suffer, but any expansion must meet noise and pollution tests.
Among options are a 2,200m third runway built north of Heathrow by 2020, and a sixth terminal, which will require the destruction of an entire village.
Critics say more than 50 communities and towns will suffer increased noise.
The new runway would be built north of the A4, and allow the airport to handle about 700,000 take-offs and landings a year by 2030. Currently there are 480,000 a year.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7106524.stm

In view of how long St Pancras took to open (20 years), should we reframe from holding our breath during the "consultation period"?

[JackHowe]

Surely it is time for an assessment of whether Heathrow is the best location for further development?
How do the location and transport links stand up (not to mention the ATC restrictions and overflying Central London) compared to major airports elsewhere (and I'm not restricting this to England or even the UK)?
Would doubling the passenger throughput of Heathrow resolve the current limitations (and could the infrastructure cope)?
RAF Lyneham and RAF Manston have been mentioned, and there were plans to build on the Thames Estuary (as well as other locations 'around' London).
Heathrow has established transport links, but these are shared with other traffic so congestion is endemic (and would increase with more passengers).
Given a clean sheet of paper (!) would Heathrow be the best choice for London Airport (and why do operators not simply move their operations elsewhere - to other so-called London Airports?)?

Could existing aviation sites be 'incorporated' into Heathrow (or other locations) and operated as satellite 'terminals' (I'm thinking of that place just north-north-east of Heathrow - Northolt) with rapid-transit links (as has been proposed for Gatwick)?

[Super VC-10]

3rd runway?

Don't know why there is all the fuss, Heathrow used to have six runways, didn't it?

[120.4]

The time for studies and investigations and assessments has long gone. These should have been done 25 years ago, the decision taken 20 years ago and the runway enter service 15 years ago.

We need action and we need it now - even on environmental grounds. The airlines are burning $5m per month going around in curcles and dumping CO2 needlessly into the atmosphere. Additional capacity, strongly managed to prevent the current situation ocurring again, is needed now. Heathrow is already scheduled to 98.5% of its capacity; this leaves nothing for error or disruption caused by wx or incident and the passenger experience at Heathrow is now shocking as a result.

The ATC system is under unacceptable pressure to deliver perfect service all the time and this is leading to corner cutting on safety. There is much evidence to support that claim.

.4

[Speedbird48]

New runway for Heathrow??

The plan to have a runway north of the Bath road is old. I left the UK in the mid 80's and it was old then!!

Since theplan was first bought up they have built the M4 and the link road to central area. Could be done, but expensive???

The air traffic issues will be the major factor in the congested airspace over the UK and as someone else has said, "what about the roads"???

Speedbird 48.

[v6g]

The most important question that needs to be answered when considering this kind of investment and expansion is: "When does the Government expect global oil production to peak and subsequently go into terminal decline".

[HZ123]

Anyway surely everyone that wants to come to the UK legally or otherwise is already here. With such a poor exchange rate in most cases air travel can take a blip at any time.

[Re-Heat]

The Northern runway was in the original plans for the airfield in the 40s. Seems we lost our foresight with the Victorians...

[Taildragger67]

FlgOffKite,

Big moves have been done before, so the 'established national airport' argument has been shown to be hollow (just takes a bit of political will):
- Tokyo (ok, Haneda still operates, but it's no longer Tokyo's main international gateway)
- Singapore (Paya Lebar still operational for military)
- Hong Kong
- Kuala Lumpur
- Denver
- Shanghai (again, Hongquing still runs, but Pudong's the main show in town and getting bigger)
- Osaka (same re Itami & Kansai)

Stansted already has at least as good transport links as EGLL: taps into good rail lines, straight into the City (now, just where do most of the customers BAA touts as needing EGLL expansion, work?), M11... main problem is it's 40 miles from the centre rather than 14...

From those examples above, I can't see why a second strip at EGSS can't go down and that become the main international gateway. If BA gets as much transit/connection traffic through EGLL as it says it does, then that'd be perfect and the distance from anywhere in the UK would not be an issue (as the punters aren't going into town).

If EGLL is as reliant on the City & Canary Wharf as they say EGLL is, then the direct train to EGSS directly answers that (EGSS to Liverpool St in 40 mins but by the time you've got the LHR Exp to Paddo, then got on the tube to, say, Liverpool St, you're far ahead coming down from EGSS).

Several of those I've mentioned have a main int'l gateway and a smaller domestic strip - so London, with EGSS and EGLL, EGKK and EGGW, London has an out-of-town, all-hours int'l plus a choice of potentially three primarily domestic/short-haul strips.

QED.

And yes, EGLL used to have six strips so I can't see what all the fuss is about, either.

Environmentally, expansion of EGSS would be better nationally as the north-of-London catchment would mean less pressure to expand Manchester, Birmingham and East Midlands. Plus it would be easier to drive a high-speed train spur to EGSS than to EGLL, to potentially link to Paris, Brussels & Amsterdam, reducing the need for flights to those centres.

One problem with a new parallel strip is that all ops are going to have to cross 27L/09R - so there will be delays. At Frankfurt, the new strip is off the end of the parallels and at Amsterdam you taxi past the end of the old strips to the new Polderbaan so there's no conflict (just a long drive in the country with the latter!)

An alternative would be to ban all aircraft under a certain size into EGLL. That is, let's say that 737-400/A320 size is the minimum - so no 737-700 or -600, no A319, no BAe146/RJ, no F50, no MD90... the A319 flights from (say) Stockholm go into EGKK or EGSS, and daily one or two larger a/c do that run into EGLL, mainly to service the long-haul connection market. BA booking systems are programmed to favour connecting pax onto the EGLL services and non-connectors get channeled onto the EGKK/EGSS runs. 'Channelling' would work by charging a premium on short-haul trips originating or finishing at EGLL whilst there would be no premium for connecting to long-haul services.

With respect to carriers other than BA using smaller aircraft, then they go straight into EGKK/EGSS anyway as EGLL will have lost its aura as 'the' London airport to go into; in any case, alliances could then run similar structures to that I've just described, for their connectors.

[PAXboy]

120.4

The airlines are burning $5m per month going around in curcles and dumping CO2 needlessly into the atmosphere.

It is true that the 4rd strip will save that BUT ... only for a while.

That is because, BAA will immediately over sell the slots as they have the existing ones. That means that a/c will soon start stacking again. UNLESS the CAA manage the slots and the delays with instructions to minimise the pollution, nothing will change.

[Skylion]

The Original 1947/8 plan was for 9 runways, 6 in a "Star of David" on the existing site . 6 of these were there at one time or another until Central Area cut across 3 of them. The other 3 were to be a triangle north of the A4 and the line of the M4 was accordingly bent to the north to accomodate this. Its alignment as the intended airport boundary is the only remaining tangible evidence of the far sighted scheme. Sipson and Harmondsworth, such as they were then, were to be largely demolished. This visionary plan was abandoned circa 1953/4 and the threat to the 2 villages lifted.

The capital cost of moving LHR somewhere else is probably too high for UK Plc to cope with. It has too many other political priorities, - eg schools, hospitals etc etc.

The new plan for the 3rd runway and 6th terminal will have short term environmental benefits in cutting stacking, taxiway queues etc and longer term is essential if LHR is not to wither on the vine. There is also a need for improved rail links including the linking of the T5 Heathrow Express and Cross rails back to the nearby western mainline as well as the occasionally spoken of scheme to provide a loop to the Feltham line and back to Waterloo. The western line to Reading would provide direct rail links to the west, north , Wales and the south west and it's incredible that a link to it is not even a blip on the horizon.

[120.4]

One problem with a new parallel strip is that all ops are going to have to cross 27L/09R - so there will be delays.

That is not correct. T6 and R3 will operate virtually as a stand alone airport. The only traffic from T6 that must use one of the main runways for departure will be Dovers. This is estimated to be about 4 per hour. Traffic from the other terminals will operate as they currently do.
Edited to add; plus any types (340!) that cannot accept 2,200m.

.4

[Torquelink]

120.4 - how will that work with, for example, airline alliances consolidated in the other terminals? Shorthaul / narrowbody services operated by whichever alliance is in, say, T4 will need to get to T4 for interlining meaning that, if shorthaul ops will be off the new runway, the aircraft will have two actives to cross to get from runway to terminal?

[120.4]

Very broadly, as I remember it one solution was, ONE world T5 & T3, STAR in T6, Sky Team in T4, Can't remember about T1/2 (East). Don't think shorthaul only off the new runway.

.4