Friday, November 23, 2007

More on Heathrow

My comments and some other good ones here:
BBC NEWS | Have Your Say | Heathrow airport expansion. Your views?

The one from Richard Collard in particular reminded me of some Government lies:

The go-ahead for T5 was given on the basis of a cap on the # of aircraft movements. That # is close to being breached even BEFORE T5 becomes operational......far less a 3rd runway and a 6th Terminal!!!!

And another one from Andrew Jones on indirect costs is worth reading too:

"A report .. by the respected INFRAS Institute in Zurich and IWW at the University of Karlssruhe put the UK's external costs of aviation at around £14 billion per annum in the year 2000. .... Brendon Sewill.. calculates that, this year, the cost is likely to be around £16 billion.
And still they want more..."

The INFRAS site is here and there's a report posted there. The findings are quite interesting, in particular if you look at the climate change impact: air travel has a larger impact than road, in spite of a much smaller ammount of passengers carried. The report begs the question on why the UK government is not investing in canals (minimal impact, etc...) rather than just Heathrow.


My comments are not online yet but they were along the lines already discussed in this blog:

1. Why are successive Governments so closely aligned with BAA?

2. London has no less than 5 airport, Heathrow is the one located in the most densely populated area and with flights path directly over a capital. Why is it the one targeted for expansion?

3. Why is the Government not investing in alternative transportation schemes, such as rail for under 150 miles? It strikes me that there's no high-speed links to Scotland and the Midlands (how many flights does this represent?) while the Eurostar took 70% share from airlines on the London-Paris passenger traffic (something to thank the French for?). And by the way, why is Eurostar not continuing after StPancras onto Heathrow?


Finally, there will be a public meeting at the Richmond Adult Community College on Friday 18th January. Be there! The online form is here.


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