Colegate I agree, but looking the other way down the Telescope, Stansted is crucial to Ryanair. They don’t have another option for this scale of access to the London market. It is in the interests of both to reach an agreement. I understand that Ryanair are just as keen to meet with the potential bidders.

WHBMTrue, but if they did know that they were different markets, it would mean someone in govt understood the airline industry - and that would never do. :hmm:

Can't see Wizz moving out of LTN. Wizz tried out Stansted a few years ago and got its fingers burnt. LTN is now firmly established as a gateway airport to Eastern Europe with Adria and Blue-Air all jumping on the Wizz bandwagon.

Also I would not think they would like operating out of Ryanair's home base.

In 2 or 3 years Luton will have increased its capacity by 80%. It might be STN that needs to worry as LTN looks to the east to fill its expanded airport.

As has been mentioned many times in the STN vs LTN debate the one factor that will always be an issue for STN is location, location, location!

To those who think LTN's exec traffic will suddenly be lured to Essex.....Hmm, why hasn't this already happened then!? STN already has plenty of parking space North side & several FBO's who will happily oblige! A possible (but unlikely) reduction in landing fees isn't going to make much difference to a Gulfstream owner who wants to be in the West End pronto after landing!

Both Signature and Ocean Sky at LTN are making big investments in new facilities and will want to make sure they get some return in the future!

I think the weakest selling point for Stansted is the poor ground transport to and from London. Below is an illustration I've made showing only travel times for all London airport to Marble Arch departing the airport around 9 am. As you can see I have looked at three modes of transport: rail/underground/DLR, taxi/car and coach/bus. The distances shown are measured linear distances, not actual distances driven.

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/23931688/Il..._transport.jpg

Sources for these travel times are Transport for London Journey Planner and TomTom Route Planner. For Southend Airport I had to use also the National Rail Enquiries and First Essex websites (Southend Airport is the only London airport that is not included in the Transport for London Journey Planner).

Luton's weak link is the 5 minute shuttle bus between the station and the terminal which can take 15 minutes if you have just missed a bus. Once at the station it has non stop trains to and from London which take as little as 20 minutes as well as the regular First Capital Connect and Southern train services. Also it serves a large number of stations directly both north and south of the Thames making it an ideal airport for many passengers.

The Stansted Express is fine except I would not call it an express service which makes it seem that Stansted is futher out from London than it really is.

I would say the soft belly of LTN is the public transport to and from the airport. At my home airport, OSL, the distance from the airport to the city centre is exactly the same as from LTN to Marble Arch. If you are traveling with the Airport Express train from OSL to the National Theatre it takes only 27 minutes - and that is less than one third of what the travel time is from LTN.

So are we assuming that the population of London and all those that fly from there reside under Marble Arch? From my home in London (which is actually south of the river) both Stansted and Gatwick take the same time to drive, despite Stansted being further in distance. Luton is fine by train but a bloody pain in the ar$€ to treck across central London by car.

Agreed that the Stansted Express is slow, I remember when the new terminal opened in 1991 it had a journey time of just 41 minutes with the stop at Tottenham Hale so what happened? Plus it's really expensive for what it is.

Stansted has a good catchment area which undoubtedly overlaps with that of Luton and Gatwick. However we all know that the 'customer' will go with which ever airline offers the best fare and from which ever airport that happens to be as a majority.

Good luck to Stansted and I really do hope that the sale brings with it a wave of new (and maybe some old) airlines at what is a fantastic and user friendly facility to use.

A strong point of Luton which is often missed is how much better for the Midlands it is than Stansted.

Bearing in mind lots of the thinner eastern routes will not all support BHX / EMA or even MAN and so travelling to London is a must - Luton is 40 minutes to an hour closer to Birmingham, Nottingham, Leicester etc.

Stansted holds the advantage for Norwich, Peterborough, Cambridge, much smaller cities.

Luton also has plentiful free parking in the town :)

There are not many places in London that take that long as the Thameslink rail service has 5 principle railway stations in the heart of London. Also St Pancras connects with 6 underground lines and Blackfriars a further 2.

Unfortunately, as was only to be expected, this had degenerated into a Luton V Stansted debate. I suppose it’s only a matter of time before Southend arrive at the party!

I'm not even tempted.....

Nothing much wrong with Stansted. At the end of the day Stansted has the greatest potential of all London airports to expand as it has the space to grow.

Southend has the most to lose as it does not have any fallback if easyjet shifts its 3 aircraft. Can't see them doing that anytime soon but then I didn't see them shifting capacity from Stansted to Southend either.

Every London airport is a pain in some way or another. For me, travelling from a regional airport is always less stressful andobviously less time consuming.

LTN is a nightmare if you want to get into London by public transport, and if you have to do it regularly then forget it. I used ot hate standing outside waiting in the freezing cold for the shuttle bus to slowly chug around and take me to the station and again wait in the freezin cold for an old train to take me into London with the terrifying rattling windows every time a train wizzed past on the opposite side of the tracks. Only very price sensitive people will put up with the increased stress associated with LTN and to a lesser extent STN (maybe even SEN & LGW) to get to and from London - and that has been their success - LCC and bucket&spade.

If you can afford it, you will fly into LHR or LCY as a number one preference.

It is only Heathrow that has decent trains. All the other airports use commuter stock including Gatwick which is served by the very same train that you hate.

I have tried LGW by train a couple of times a long time ago, although I don't seem to remember sh**ing my pants every time a train went by on the other line on that one.

Ramp Rat mentioned Flybe earlier and they were one of my first thoughts - if you look at their network from LGW it is an excellent fit for STN.

Channel Islands aside, which I can't really see moving, none of the other routes are served from STN and BE do in fact have competition from EZY at LGW on a few of them (ABZ, IOM, INV). Add in the arrival of EI on the BHD route (a destination STN has recently lost) and LGW's recent dislike of smaller aircraft it becomes a nice rumour.

But you have to spend an hour on the Piccadilly Line or get burnt in the pocket for using the LHR Express!

I'd say rail services to the London airports are satisfactory, but nothing more than that. Considering the locations, its probably only as good as it can be.

A better option between Heathrow Express and the tube is Heathrow connect, every half an hour, 25 minute journey to Paddington for 9.10 single on modern trains.