New Thames Airport for London

[Skipness One Echo]

.Boris is now planning a four runway Stansted.

He's been repeatedly told his Fantasy Island is unaffordable and has now fallen back supporting an idea the travelling public continue to shun in their millions, Essex International. How many more times do we have the pretence that Stansted is the answer? Only government intervention can make that happen and none of the airlines would move without regulation.
Meanwhile a four runway LHR is now being touted with the clear view that the end game is presentable as saving green fields in Essex and only ONE teeny wee new bit of concrete at LHR. Affordable and politically accetable once you wrap it up like that.

[silverstrata]

Skip

only ONE teeny wee new bit of concrete at LHR.

Only one more strip of concrete in totally the wrong location -

- with yet more noise and danger to London itself;
- at an airport that is still not linked to the rail system without passing through London;
- and has not a hope in hell of ever getting a TGV link, not even HS2;
- and was so unimportant they could not even be bothered to put Crossrail through it;
- an airport so welcoming I breath a sigh of relief every time I manage to miss it.


Another strip of concrete on a white elephant? Why?

Prediction for you skippy. The first crash of a 747 airborne eastbound out of LHR, and the place will be closed down inside 3 months.

Can you really centralize the connectivity and wealth of the S.E. on such an uncertain and unreliable prospect?

.

[Libertine Winno]

I thought Boris was Mayor of London, not Essex...or Kent, for that matter?!

This is all clearly about votes, lets not kid ourselves. Boris wins votes around Heathrow by opposing expansion, whilst promoting expansion at places he has no jurasdiction over and have no impact on his reelection or otherwise.

Simple politics really, politics that Cameron and co should shrug off and do what their job is i.e. what's best for the country, not what a few people living round Heathrow think

[Skipness One Echo]

I agree, a major crash like that and the bank gets broken to fix it.
You're a CPL so we both know such crashes are a manageable risk. BA038 was bloody close though! Risk is part of life, and I won't defend the isses you raise there as you're spot on. We only disagree on your ideal being unaffordable given austerity and debt.

Incidenally, the only B747 crash in the UK was into a field near Stansted!

[Fairdealfrank]

Boris is now planning a four runway Stansted.

Ho ho ho, finally Boris hoists the white flag over the sinking Silver Island, the plans clearly do not hold water!

Of course Stansted has most of the problems and disadvantages of Silver Island and as mentioned many times before: it does not address the issue of a lack of HUB capacity.

Look closely at the picture of the four-rwy Stansted (above), there's no activity there, nothing landing or taking off at the Essex airport: "the only way is Mirabel".


Quote: "Actually, I think this proposal is a spoiler. In reality, Boris wants to scare the people of Bishops Stortford into campaigning for a Silver-Boris Thames airport. And there is nothing that scares the burghers of Bishops Stortford more than a 4-runway Stansted (check out where that northerly runway ends)."

More likely they'll be scared into campaigning for 2 more rwys at Heathrow, it's affordable, realistic, what the industry wants and DEFINITELY prevents Stansted expansion. If Silver Island were to be as big and successful as the fantasists suggest, it could lead to the closure of Stansted, putting local jobs at risk. Think on!


Quote: "Meanwhile a four runway LHR is now being touted with the clear view that the end game is presentable as saving green fields in Essex and only ONE teeny wee new bit of concrete at LHR. Affordable and politically accetable once you wrap it up like that."

Spot on, Skipness.


Quote: "This is all clearly about votes, lets not kid ourselves. Boris wins votes around Heathrow by opposing expansion, whilst promoting expansion at places he has no jurasdiction over and have no impact on his reelection or otherwise.

Simple politics really, politics that Cameron and co should shrug off and do what their job is i.e. what's best for the country, not what a few people living round Heathrow think"

Indeed it is, but the Commission reports in 2015, Boris's term expires in 2016. Is he going for a third term? Is he going back into Parliament? It's up to Cameron to face down Clegg, but he won't do it, so in coalition politics, the tail wags the dog.

[canberra97]

747 Crash

Skipness am surprised in you, how could you forget the Pan Am Boeing 747 that crashed over Scotland in 1988!

PA103 from London Heathrow bound for New York JFK was blown up and crashed over Lockerbie, Scotland on the 21st December 1988 with a loss of 270 people including 11 living in Lockerbie.

Sure the Lockerbie disaster was not like the Korean Cargo flight KE8509 Boeing 747 that crashed into a field shortly after take off from London Stansted on the 22 December 1999 but it was still a crash that happened in the UK that included a Boeing 747 but with far more deaths, now picture that over London!

So therefore we have two incidents of Boeing 747s crashing in the UK.

Strange how those two crashes occurred on those dates 21 and 22 December so very near there anniversarys!

[Skipness One Echo]

Dear God I apologise! You are quite right, tunnel vision on my part. Indeed I shared a flat at uni with a chap who had lived on Sherwood Crescent whose family were spared.

[DaveReidUK]

Dear God I apologise! You are quite right, tunnel vision on my part.

Don't apologise.

Lockerbie, while tragic, is entirely irrelevant in this context.

Unless you are suggesting that no 747s, indeed no commercial aircraft at all, should overfly any part of the UK lest they should be downed as a result of terrorist activity.

I do agree, however, that had the fans on BAW38 stopped a couple of minutes earlier, we would not be having a debate at all on whether Heathrow should remain open.

[scotbill]

One of the sad facts about Lockerbie was that there was a very strong jet stream over Scotland that night. But for that the wreckage would have fallen in open ground (of which there is an abundance in the area) and the town would not have been forever associated in our minds with the tragedy.

[CelticRambler]

Originally Posted by silverstrata

Prediction for you skippy. The first crash of a 747 airborne eastbound out of LHR, and the place will be closed down inside 3 months.

Unlikely - El Al 1862 didn't close AMS nor Concorde/CDG. Any such incident will be downplayed as extremely unlikely (true) and unforeseeable (true-ish if your foresight is limited to the next election date).

A mid-air collision over London, OTOH, that would be a different story ...

[silverstrata]

Skippy


Incidenally, the only B747 crash in the UK was into a field near Stansted!

Just as well it was not lifting off from 09R at LHR, eh?

This is, of course, one of the many elephants in this particular room, and nobody is talking about it. It just lurks in a dark corner. Yes, there are 'small but undeniable risks' in aviation - but when you increase traffic to 500,000 movements a year, and when you jam those movements as close together as humanly possible, you substantially increase those 'small but undeniable risks'.

At what point in time do you recognize the fact that placing your major airport in the western boundaries of your capital city, so that all flights have to pass over your capital city, was a major error in planning? No, I will rephrase that - LHR was never planned, it just happened and nobody has ever had the balls to say "Enough!"

Well now some influential people are beginning at last to wake up and say "Enough!"

Frank

Of course Stansted has most of the problems and disadvantages of Silver Island and as mentioned many times before: it does not address the issue of a lack of HUB capacity.

Once more you dodge the central issue. The whole point of making a new six-runway hub airport, is that LHR is closed down by act of Parliament. There would be no point otherwise, as everyone would try to struggle on at LHR with all the attendant noise, pollution, transport and danger issues that implies.

Either Silver-Stanstead or Silver-Boris would become the defacto new NW Europe hub, or the reluctant airlines would have to foxtrot oscar to CDG or AMS. And personally, I see no problem here. Secretly, I bet every airline manager in the world would rather they operated from a new London airport, than struggle on with LHR and all its overcrowding and slot issues. All they are looking for, is for someone else to blame - "Oh, terribly sorry Captain Nigel of BA, I know you have a lovely house in Windsor, but you are going to have to go to Essex. Not my decision, I'm afraid; completely out of my hands...."

Snigger, snigger, and lots of Essex-girl jokes......




.

[silverstrata]

Celtic:

Unlikely - El Al 1862 didn't close AMS nor Concorde/CDG. Any such incident will be downplayed as extremely unlikely.

Concorde crashed on an empty hotel - because it was taking off from a rural CDG airport, and not over the center of Paris.

The El Al 747 also took off from a rural AMS airport, and not over central Amsterdam. It also 'fortuitously' hit the side of a block of flats which contained the crash in a very small locality, instead of spreading itself all over several busy streets full of Christmas shoppers.

The Stansted 747 was also on take off from a rural airport. And it has to be noted that both of these 747s were freighters, otherwise there would have been more of an outcry. I'm not sure if that was luck, or whether it says something about freighters.

Neither of these tragedies are comparable to a take-off from 09R at LHR. That is one of the major points of moving LHR into the Tames estuary. A crash on the marshes would be tragic, but manageable.

[Barling Magna]

Wow, Essex girl jokes haven't been around for a good few years. How nice to be reminded of them.

I note that another group of dreamers are proposing to build the new London Airport on the Goodwin Sands. Let us hope they salvage that Dornier Do17 before they cover the Sands with concrete.

BBC News - Fourth South East England hub airport proposal unveiled

[Libertine Winno]

Forgive the pedantry, but surely there would be a similar risk on a westerly departure from Silver-Boris Thames Estuary Fantasy Airport (or something similar...) as there is from an easterly 09 departure from LHR, except that the impact zone will be Docklands as opposed to Hounslow?! It's not as if either locations are blessed with acres of open countryside to play with!

[DaveReidUK]

At what point in time do you recognize the fact that placing your major airport in the western boundaries of your capital city, so that all flights have to pass over your capital city, was a major error in planning?

That's not strictly true.

When LHR was opened, ILS hadn't been invented and the piston-engined airliners that were around at the time used a Standard Beam Approach, which involved overflying the airfield, then an outbound leg with a procedure turn which, in the case of westerly operations, would take the aircraft over Brentford/Kew before becoming established inbound on the beam.

The need to be established at 8-10nm or more, thereby overflying central London, didn't arise until the advent of jet aircraft in the 1950s. Whether that arguably should have been foreseen in the 40s is a moot point, however as you rightly say we are now stuck with the consequences.

[ZOOKER]

And now............

London Silver-Foster-Boris-Goodwin.

[BALHR]

Wrong...."Fantasy" means "imagining things that are impossible or improbable.".
The key word here is "Improbable"..Fair to say that described the financing and the building of the 'Boris Fantasy Airport'.

Much cheaper and technically feasibly, unlike an airport built on water, sand, slush or whatever. Would be to expand LHR, even if house owners had to be compensated.
The Thames airport would be revolutionary and not possible to cost, building aircraft carriers is a proven technology, but the two UK Carriers under construction, have not met the original estimates.
Impossible to cost.not even sure when it would be ready if it was possible to build, and the buying of all the London Airports is far fetched.

THA can be financed (or way or another) and it can be built (it’s just a bigger version of HKIA), the question is that if it is a good idea
Without a doubt expanding LHR is the best solution to fix the lack of capacity, but the question is that is there the political will…

I can say without a doubt a doubt that THA would be the most expensive project (airport or otherwise) ever built in Europe (if not the World) however…

As for buying all of London’s Airports, well it can do that and if not, withdraw their licences (or banning commercial aviation from those airports), without doing those kind of actions then all the money for THA will go down to the bottom of Thames…

It's not what I think or prefer. Look at the facts, this is the FOURTH version of Greater London government. Why do they keep changing it? Because they cannot get it to work. Maybe the status quo ante would be better! This option should at least be looked at.

Actually it’s the 2nd; the first was the Greater London Authority (1965-1985), then they spit the powers between Westminster and the LGA’s (1985-2000) and now we have the Greater London Authority (2000- ), look there has been once change and the only reason there was a chance entirely due to cynical political strategy


So they haven’t “kept changing it” and the one time they have changed it has nothing to do with the fact it was not working for “London”

If you count the times “London” politics has changed (the term Greater London, pre 1965, was a informal term), then it has changed 4 times:
Historically London has been governed by the City of London (now that a local government body that needs changing), but by the 19th century it barely covered any part of the urban area and was undemocratic, plus there was a lack of co-ordination and overall planning between the local government bodies within that urban era, so they created the Metropolitan Board of Works, this consisted of nearly all the local government bodies within the local urban area, but the problem was that it has limited powers, so it became the London County Council (which also absorbed local boards covering the same area)


By the mid-20th century however, the LCC only covered part of the now expanded urban area, so they merged the LCC with the county of Middlesex (minus some outlying areas) and some outlying areas of Kent, Essex and Hertfordshire and to form Greater London

You have to remember the local urban governments change over time, to reflect the urban areas and to make sure the city is well run, this does not just affect London…

Then why have them at all? Under your scheme you may as well have a New York City structure: a mayor and bureaucracy plus a city council and 59 community boards with a right to be "consulted" on local issues.

It makes a mockery of the word "local", even the boroughs we have now are too remote.

Well you still need them to understand what local services they need and how things should be run when it comes to your local area, which is why NYC still has boroughs (and yes I used their local system as the basis of my idea)

The reason our “local” boroughs are “remote” is that they are too focused on doing things they are best done at a regional level, at the expense of things they are better served by them

Please, no regional government, what we have already is too big, too bureaucratic, too expensive and too remote. At least the citizens of the north east had the good sense to chuck it out in a referendum when it was proposed them.

We should not go down the route of regional government. Look at the trouble in Spain, where the "autonomous communities" (regions) are asking the Spanish government for bailouts, and one, Catalonia, wants a bailout and independence at the same time!

We already have regional governments; Northern Ireland has had one since 1923, along with Scotland and Wales in 1999 (which have their origins in Regional Offices set up in the late 1970s) and I haven’t even got to the autonomous governments of our (now independent) colonies like Canada, Australia, South Africa and India

Greater London (which is a region of “England”) already has a regional government as well, it called the GLA, the trouble is that it does not cover the Home Counties (where a increasing number of “Londoners” live), but you have to note that the GLA is a far smaller body (for now) than the GLC ever was

Also London (unlike the North East) has voted in favour of regional government, hence we are the only region in England to have devolved powers and it looks like it will stay that way (even after the government scrapped legacy quangos in relation to those regions)

As for the problems of Spain, they are caused by the fact their economic system is not working for them and nether is austerity (and the mismanagement in ALL levels of government), in fact without regional governments (which have more powers than what we have here) Spain would have broken up years ago…

By the way Catalonia want either a bailout OR independence, not both (the main issue they have is that they have to make hash spending cuts and yet give a lot of money to Madrid)

No the GLA wants scrapping not expanding, we certainly do not want or need a fifth version!


The case for an English parliament has always been strong while there is devolution in the rest of the country: it's the only way to answer the West Lothian question. However, it is obviously not going to happen for the reason mentioned previously.

I am not calling for a 3rd/5th version of local government, but more powers and covering the surrounding areas as well, along with more control of London + South East tax and spend policy (we give 1/5 of our tax money to other regions of the UK, rightly or wrongly)

Yes there should be a English Parliament without a doubt, it’s very much right, but it should not include London + South East (or Cornwall, but for separate reasons), there is too big a difference between the rest of England and this region, otherwise England will suffer from unfair domination from one region over the rest…

No it's a fantasy that only exists in your head. As has been explained to you, your proposal is not remotely likely given the austerity of the current economic climate.

It’s a suggestion actually, you are misusing the term “fantasy” and like I have said several times, the best solution economically is a bigger LHR, but the problem is that this whole debate is not based around just what is best “economically” for better or worse

I've just realised that not only is BALHR a loony, he's also a loony lefty. The notion that one giant nationalised company, whether you wish to call it LAL or otherwise, should manage everything from Gatwick to Damyns Hall was not even in Clement Attlee's wildest dreams. How can it expect to do this efficiently? Lessons learnt way back in the 1970s showed us and the rest of Europe that government control on this scale simply couldn't work. Your apparent desire for more government authority and sweeping statements that Boris is an 'idiot' don't show you in the best light.

Look, if you are indeed 21 then I am significantly younger than you. Even I have one request. Please, get a grip and listen to the advice of Skipness One Echo and a number of others. You're wasting your time here: go and look at the real world, learn some stuff and then come back presenting realistic and informed opinions.

You have clearly not read all my post’s on this matter:

Let me make it 100% clear…

My preferred solution is expanding LHR, which would be funding entirely though private means

However that solution is currently politically difficult by a “Ultra-Capitalist/Free Enterprise/Pro-Business” Government that still seems to think they still own our airports, you know what I am surprised BAA/HAH are even bothering to own/run LHR, since their business is being hampered by government wrongdoing/incompetence

That is why I (and others) am proposing THA, because this is the only other way to expand airport capacity in London + South East, despite what many are saying (Boris, Silver), there is no way it can be financed by private means, mainly due to the cost (in the few hundred billions), the lack of returns (and the time it will take to get returns) and fact you need to do more than just built it (buy other airports), so the money will have to come from public sources

Now to make it work (and not waste money on a project like this), you need to make sure airlines use the airport and that is where the real problem is, hardly any of them want to (it’s understandable, why move when things are alright for you where you are), hence you have to buy all other airports so that there is no chance that they will move to that airport (and not THA), airport operators will do what they can to keep their customers with then (and not at THA) and so that you can close those airports (all of them , not just LHR, otherwise they will move elsewhere and so on…)

You cannot simply do this legally (as in the past in relation to LGW), because it’s illegal and Airlines will go to the courts over this, so buying all airports in the region is the only way airlines are going to use it and thus it will not become a White Elephant

The model I am suggesting (a used by state-owned airports in Europe, successfully) is for a private company to own/run the airport, but its owners are the state (who are also financing improvement projects), after all they are the only ones who can fund THA

So before you tell me to present “realistic and informed opinions” and “get a grip and listen to the advice of Skipness One Echo and a number of others”, read and understand what I am saying beforehand, otherwise it makes you look incompetent and ignorant (its not just you however…)
My views in Boris are only partly based on his political views, but mostly in his actions both as mayor and in other duties, this would apply even if he was left wing…

BALHR is not 'left' or 'right' and almost certainly not 21 - he's just a simple little Troll.

If I was a Troll, I wouldn’t be here; I would be busy on Facebook…

Boris is now planning a four runway Stansted.

Boris Johnson to put Stansted back on the agenda for airport expansion | Mail Online

Actually, I think this proposal is a spoiler. In reality, Boris wants to scare the people of Bishops Stortford into campaigning for a Silver-Boris Thames airport. And there is nothing that scares the burghers of Bishops Stortford more than a 4-runway Stansted (check out where that northerly runway ends).


There are many reasons why a simple expansion of Stansted would not work. The primary being that if LHR was closed, and moved to Stansted, there would not be enough capacity in the London basin for all the lo-co airlines and their lo-co passengers. You would have to build another Stansted to take up the demand for quick turnaround point-to-point work.

Airlines don’t want to use Stansted, they want to use Heathrow or Gatwick, so you would have to close both airports and to deal with all that traffic to make it world, then you would then need 6 runways at Stansted to deal with all the Ex-LHR/LGW traffic

This in an area that is strongly against expansion, even for a 2nd runway, which means this reaches a brick wall in the end

The only options are 2 more runways at LHR or closing them all down and build an 8-10 runway THA…

He's been repeatedly told his Fantasy Island is unaffordable and has now fallen back supporting an idea the travelling public continue to shun in their millions, Essex International. How many more times do we have the pretence that Stansted is the answer? Only government intervention can make that happen and none of the airlines would move without regulation.
Meanwhile a four runway LHR is now being touted with the clear view that the end game is presentable as saving green fields in Essex and only ONE teeny wee new bit of concrete at LHR. Affordable and politically accetable once you wrap it up like that.

The problem with THA is not that it’s unaffordable (it can be funded though public means, one way or another), but that if it’s a good idea overall, the answer is that if LHR can be expanded, then no (if not, then yes)

It’s now illegal (and subject to lawsuits) to use regulation to force use of this airport, you can only do this by closing down LHR and LGW

The best solution for London + South East is not expansion at Gatwick (1/4 of the space is used by airlines that want to use LHR), Stinted/Luton (they are only half-full) or even only a 3rd runway at LHR

No, the answer is a 3rd AND 4th runway at LHR

Only one more strip of concrete in totally the wrong location -

- with yet more noise and danger to London itself;
- at an airport that is still not linked to the rail system without passing through London;
- and has not a hope in hell of ever getting a TGV link, not even HS2;
- and was so unimportant they could not even be bothered to put Crossrail through it;
- an airport so welcoming I breath a sigh of relief every time I manage to miss it.


Another strip of concrete on a white elephant? Why?

Prediction for you skippy. The first crash of a 747 airborne eastbound out of LHR, and the place will be closed down inside 3 months.

Can you really centralize the connectivity and wealth of the S.E. on such an uncertain and unreliable prospect?

The trouble is that LHR’s location is a curse and a benefit, it’s great for the passengers to get to, but the problem is that it hampers to development due to the fact it’s very close (and its flightpath to residential areas…)

They are improving links to the rail network from LHR by building another link to the GWML to the West of England/South Wales/Midlands and the rest can be sorted by AirTrack

HS2 might not directly link the airport, but that is merely to domestic connection flights out of LHR

Crossrail will link LHR to the City and East of London and improve connections to the rest of London + South East

They are also improving the Terminals as well, T5 is built, T2 will follow and by the within 10-15 years, all that will be left from the 20th century will be T4

If they can expand LHR, then we should do it, if not then we might we well close LHR and the other airports and build THA

I thought Boris was Mayor of London, not Essex...or Kent, for that matter?!

This is all clearly about votes, lets not kid ourselves. Boris wins votes around Heathrow by opposing expansion, whilst promoting expansion at places he has no jurasdiction over and have no impact on his reelection or otherwise.

Simple politics really, politics that Cameron and co should shrug off and do what their job is i.e. what's best for the country, not what a few people living round Heathrow think

The ultimate reason is that they can increasingly no longer win outside the South East of England in all levels of government, they barely exist in Scotland these days and their electoral presence in Wales and the North of England is declining, not to mention the rise of UKIP is taking chunks of their remaining potential voters

That is why they are only in government with the help of the Lib Dems (who have paid a heavy price for this), this is also the reason they don’t support expansion of LHR/LGW/LTN/STN/LCY (they cannot afford to lose further votes in areas that are their heartlands)

What I am hoping is that Labour comes to power (after the next election), they have nothing to lose by approving the expansion of LHR and LGW…

Ho ho ho, finally Boris hoists the white flag over the sinking Silver Island, the plans clearly do not hold water!

Of course Stansted has most of the problems and disadvantages of Silver Island and as mentioned many times before: it does not address the issue of a lack of HUB capacity.

Look closely at the picture of the four-rwy Stansted (above), there's no activity there, nothing landing or taking off at the Essex airport: "the only way is Mirabel".

Can we not name THA after some member of a avation forum?

Firstly Boris needs to accept that to make STN work as a hub for London, you need to shut both LHR and LGW (which could have been posibble if BAA/HAH still owned LHR, LGW and STN) and you need then need to have 6 runnways at STN (not 4) to deal with the traffic, you would also need to improve transport links as well

Better to approve 2 more runnways at LHR (you would find it as difficult to build even R2 at STN, let alone another 5)

More likely they'll be scared into campaigning for 2 more rwys at Heathrow, it's affordable, realistic, what the industry wants and DEFINITELY prevents Stansted expansion. If Silver Island were to be as big and successful as the fantasists suggest, it could lead to the closure of Stansted, putting local jobs at risk. Think on!

In the case THA, you will need to close all 6 of London's commercial airports, otherwise it would become "Mirabel-on-Sea"

Indeed it is, but the Commission reports in 2015, Boris's term expires in 2016. Is he going for a third term? Is he going back into Parliament? It's up to Cameron to face down Clegg, but he won't do it, so in coalition politics, the tail wags the dog.

This will partly change if Labour wins a majoirty at the next election in 2015, they have nothing to lose if they approve another 2 runnways at LHR (remember that they approved R3 when they where last in power...)

Once more you dodge the central issue. The whole point of making a new six-runway hub airport, is that LHR is closed down by act of Parliament. There would be no point otherwise, as everyone would try to struggle on at LHR with all the attendant noise, pollution, transport and danger issues that implies.

Either Silver-Stanstead or Silver-Boris would become the defacto new NW Europe hub, or the reluctant airlines would have to foxtrot oscar to CDG or AMS. And personally, I see no problem here. Secretly, I bet every airline manager in the world would rather they operated from a new London airport, than struggle on with LHR and all its overcrowding and slot issues. All they are looking for, is for someone else to blame - "Oh, terribly sorry Captain Nigel of BA, I know you have a lovely house in Windsor, but you are going to have to go to Essex. Not my decision, I'm afraid; completely out of my hands...."

Snigger, snigger, and lots of Essex-girl jokes......

Good to see that you are agreeing that STN needs 6 runnways to even begin to consider itself viable as a hub...

However to make STN work, you would need to buy at the very least LHR, and LGW and close both airports

The main reason BA and others still prefer LHR is its location, to make that work you would need to close that aiport and LGW, that would make STN the best in terms of location (and maybe transport links) our of all of Londons airports

I note that another group of dreamers are proposing to build the new London Airport on the Goodwin Sands. Let us hope they salvage that Dornier Do17 before they cover the Sands with concrete.

BBC News - Fourth South East England hub airport proposal unveiled

I think we nedd to focus on 2 options, a bigger LHR (up to 4 runways or close them all down and build a 8-10 runway THA (and stick to one plan, not three diffrent ones)

If "London Goodwin" is built, they would need at last 8, not 4 runways for a start...

[silverstrata]

.

And just to add to the confusion, we now have a proposal for a London airport in the Channel. Nice location for an airport, depending on its weather record, but hardly suitable for surface transport to most of England.

Beckett Rankine: £40billion airport for London... in the middle of the Channel | Mail Online

A Channel airport does not give us another Thames motorway crossing, it does not give us the much-needed second Thames barrage, and it does not give us easy surface links to London and beyond. Indeed, it hardly gives good surface connections to Europe, either. Bit of a non-starter, really.

Personally, I regard this proposal as being made for the same reasons as the peculiar Stansted proposal. Hopefully, enough people will look at this proposal and think: "an airport in the estuary would be better than this...."

Precisely.

Libertine:

Forgive the pedantry, but surely there would be a similar risk on a westerly departure from Silver-Boris Thames Estuary Fantasy Airport (or something similar...) as there is from an easterly 09 departure from LHR, except that the impact zone will be Docklands as opposed to Hounslow?!

Which is why I have written to all of these consortiums, pointing out their error and suggesting a S.W. orientation for their airport.

This is why these airports are known as the Silver-Boris or Silver-Foster Thames airports, because they would make a complete hash of the project without my enlightened suggestions.



.

[ETOPS]

BALHR

Too many words again, son. None of us have the time (or inclination) to plough through that lot.

Try writing bite sized replies that we can digest easily.........

[DaveReidUK]

Try writing bite sized replies that we can digest easily.........

Seconded.

He might also want go easy on the helpful advice like telling us to

read and understand what I am saying beforehand, otherwise it makes you look incompetent and ignorant