I had not heard about the trial, but March is a long way away and I would probably have forgotten about it by then if I was told now.
250 below 10,000' is a good idea in my view. I am amazed how often an airprox is preceded by the words " no ATC speed restriction".
Maintaining 250 Kts will not only give better spacing, it will reduce noise, get us above the 4,000' noise restriction sooner there bye allowing us to leave the SID on a heading for a shorter routing particularly on LHR northbounds.
Will this mean we can reduce the departure interval on the Detling/Dover LHR departures?
So , yes this one gets my vote.

Bad Bear,

in short no!!

If it was a case of only having A/C coming from one airfield, or even from both heathrow and gatwick, then it would have a good chance of working, as for the routes it will affect, they are roughly the same geographical starting point.

Unfortunately it is not just those airports, it is a case of integrating traffic from London City, Luton, Stansted, and Northolt as well, plus the other low lying airfields in that area that kick out the odd flight now and again.

Tied in with needing to use vectors to get A/C away from lots of different inbound routes and the holds to enable a climb, the bunching issue will still be there.

If we do not vector off the SIDs (which would go a long way to preventing bunching)

a) Heathrow and Gatwick SIDS are not separated via DET/DVR
b) A/C would get much later climbs due to A/C now coming into conflict with others that would never have been a problem before....
C) The ATCOS job becomes much more difficult because there will be lots of A/C 8 miles East of Biggin needing a climb
d) all of the above would make things less safe

Just to clarify Bad Bear, it is the taking you off the SIDS to give you a climb that is one of the main reasons for bunching, as you are vectored out of any natural stream that may have occurred. Whether you are flying at 250kts or not does not change that fact!!

The only real way to prevent bunching is for all the London TMA airfield to coordinate departures with each other..... I am not going to hold my breath as that is totally impracticable

Nothing in the NOTAMS so far, when will this become effective????

Allegedley March, tho we have not been informed officially yet, the paperwork has been drafted, but not released.

We need 21 days notice, so expecting it soon; we have been told by management that the airlines have all been informed

Ha, Ha! - rubbish:}

Well its not rubbish from our end. Our top guys have heard something, but nothing as yet to the troops.

It may well be that all UK airlines HAVE been informed, but as someone said above, they may not have distributed it a month or so early?

Well it'll stop our 14sicks holding up everyone else

Possibly a few urban myths here.....Actually, vectoring off the SIDs has been the CAUSE of much bunching.
There is a "culture" issue here.
As ATCOs (everywhere) we spend our time trying to shorten routes, climb a/c asap etc. Often we are our own worst enemy in that by shorting routes, and not stopping off climbs, we create many more conflicts than would actually exist if everything WAS left on the SIDs and climbed to vertically separated levels.
I might also take issue with: True. But if you stick to VERTICAL separation they can be. The two tracks do not merge until DVR. Ample time for some parallel headings or even a little dog leg to position one behind the other. Positioning is more important than an early climb.
So? if capacity is increased, being "held down" for 7 mins or so (28 miles) seems a small price (particularly when the overall journey is one of Several HOURS
There's that culture thing again, "Needing a Climb". Sure, they will need to be climbed, but it's NOT that urgent. Better positioning (and capacity) is what we're after here.
. Disagree here. Safest form of separation is VERTICAL, it's also the quickest and easiest to apply.

Next time you have the opportunity in the SIM, try it. Keep the sectors split so you have plenty of RT time Leave the a/c on the SIDs, restrict climb to vertically safe levels, and have a go at positioning the a/c in trail later in the SID. All the target levels to AREA are climbing to, rather than level at, so there's no rush.

It IS a BIG culture change, and many people don't react well to change as we are all too well aware. But try it. I have. It DOES actually work.

Best rgds
BEX

I very much appreciate the higher speed (at 6000´)to get out of London TMA. No reason though to blast through the first turns at high speed, but when on a straight course the higher speed is very much desired, weather permitting og course.
p.s. In the U.S (the land of the free) ATC is not at liberty to cancel the speed restriction. It´s the law!;)

Here in the States we do, indeed, adhere to a 250 kt below 10000' restriction. Houston TRACON (Dep/Arr controllers) did have a waiver to eliminate that restriction for a couple of years as a trial but they have since rescinded that and have restored the 250kt restriction.

Standard reason for having the speed held to 250kt is because of all the uncontrolled (i.e. general aviation) traffic below 10000'. I would think that even though there are not the numbers of light aircraft in the UK that there are here you still have a significant number clustered around your terminal areas and you would want to get the jets up and out of your lower airspace.

My company's SOPs require us to climb at BESEC (green dot for the 'bus) to 3000' agl before we accelerate to 250kts. Certain departure procedures like ATL and LAX want 250kts right away so we give them that.

Hopefully I will be flying into the UK in the next year or two after we sort out this merger so I will look forward to working with you gents in ATC. Until then I will keep myself up to speed as best I can via these discussions.

Another half-baked bonus-related management initiative - deep joy.
How can this increase capacity when the outbounds will be on the TC freq for a considerably longer time? Thereby reducing RT capacity - one of the great criticisms from aircrew these days is not being able to get in on the RT.
Miss the stack, climb like the clappers and give them to AC - then take on the next wave.
My very first "airmiss" 25+ years ago was a 727 departing given " no speed "
rapidly rammed up the rear by a " restricted" DC-9 on a different SID (& freq).
The sectors ARE split as often as possible and, in any event, only takes a few seconds to achieve.

I must disagree with the comments regarding bunching of aircraft out of the TMA. One of the main reasons for bunching must be the large tollerances to slot times airfields are given. DVR's from LL always meet DVR's from KK!
I see restricting aircraft to 250kts, increasing my work load and increasing noise to the environment because not all aircraft will be able to clean up.
I want high speed, if possible. so I can get aircraft up and away to another frequency.
I do not see this trial lasting long or being fully adhered too.

We were informed a couple of days ago about the trial in march.

Is this going to be similar to the trial currently being run at Manchester or is the said trial at Man now a fixture and fitting?

According to the airfield plates, it's now a fixture and fitting..
Although if it's quiet, the restriction is cancelled.

:ok:

RE:250kts
 

Danny -- on many occasions I have gotten "fly your best operational speed" directive from controllers out of some the U.S.'s major airports, including my last flight 2 days ago, on a aircraft that not to often has a clean speed over 250. So I'm not so sure on your comment that it's standard SOP not to be given over 250kts on departure. From what I understand the 250 rule under 10k is intended primarily to guard fast aircraft from effects of bird strikes. A valid though operationally frustrating concern since the most economic dep is always best rate climb from the ground up, correct?

BEXIL160 -- Vertical seperation safer than lateral seperation? how so?, I know that in LAX our company consulted with ATC as to if they reallly need the 250kt directed sid speed on our usual dep, and were told absolutely since there key concern was not vertical seperation (we could have flown the VNAP A procedure) but lateral seperation, because heavy's and lighter jets use the same or parallel runways for dep and the need for wake seperation. Another example is at YYZ in Canada where lateral seperation also seems more important to ATC as even on the ATIS you are to advise if you will intend a less speedy but more vertically efficient noise abatement procedure.

I don't doubt procedures my colleagues use in the US or Canada. Bigger places, more runways, different ATC "culture" etc, and the guys there do a great job.

Vertical separation in the UK? Because its quicker to apply (Think TCAS). The conflicting SIDs from EGLL and EGKK, aren't laterally separated (by enough). They ARE vertically separated by ATC, at least initially.

Using this inbuilt vertical sepn, and some tactical vectoring aided by the 250kt limit, it may be possible to increase the movement rates for departures. Deps would all become a lot more "systemised", and a lot less "point and shoot".

Downside? Less early climbs (not above 6000ft or so for about 7-10 mins), but more unrestricted climbs once with AREA.

To reiterate, the idea is an attempt to up the departure rates and still keep things orderly (and safe). It is a big culture change for some in UK ATC, and hence the percieved difficulties. Just because somethings have always been handled a certain way or ways, it doesn't mean that you shouldn't look for other methods that may improve traffic through put.

Keep an open mind. It's a trial at moment.

Rgds BEX

A question for our US airspace experts (if I may):
FAR91.117 Aircraft Speed states in para(a) 'Unless authorized by the Administrator, no person may operate an aircraft below 10,000 feet MSL at an indicated airspeed of more than 250 knots (288 m. p. h.).'
Para (d) states 'If the minimum safe airspeed for any particular operation is greater than the maximum speed prescribed in this section, the aircraft may be operated at that minimum speed.'
As others have already stated many of the 'heavies' at high weights will have a min clean above 250kt. Can therefore para (d) be applied - are min safe & min clean synonymous in this context - or should I be climbing with Flap 1 to 10,000ft?

Didn't have a clue but my company only tell us about fodcoms six months late and are implementing cap371v4 the day before they have to!!!:}