Under Heathrow flight path: emissions, noise and stowaway

The two millions of Londoners living under the Heathrow flight paths are subject to noise, emissions and tragically bodies falling from planes in their final approach.

It happens every 2-4 years as it did this morning > Telegraph: Police discovered stowaway's legs 'sticking out' of roof


This illustration from the Telegraph is obviously wrong as the planes were landing on the South runway that morning, which is aligned with Richmond.

Update: another one on the 14/12/20. 


Related posts:

• Stowaway death is a chilling reminder that the Heathrow runways point directly over London and 2 millions Londoners
• Heathrow is not safe: chilling crash map
• Heathrow is just dangerous where it is
• Stating the obvious: Heathrow expansion will pollute more
• Heathrow is dangerous and should not be expanded, here's why

Heathrow fakes it

Gatwick airport claims Heathrow set up fake support group for new runway
Back Heathrow, which gets funding from west London airport, says it represents local businesses and residents




Gwyn Topham, transport correspondent, The Guardian, Wednesday 3 December 2014 13.37 GMT




    
Here's what happens when lobbies take over societies. In case you haven't been following, the story goes that way: government gives up on planning vital infrastructure (Maplin Sands, 1973, Labour), then privatises it (Tory, 1986), forces it to sell off assets (Tory, 2009), resulting in each of the SIX international airports around London being owned by different (often foreign) shareholders. The result is all of them pitching for their own (shareholders) interests -at the expense of greater public good. Ensues a lot of private propaganda, etc., but no one saying simple things such as high-speed rail being a good alternative for (2006, Labour).
  


Related posts

• On the aviation consultation -lobbies hijacked a great opportunity to get it right
• Stowaway death is a chilling reminder that the Heathrow runways point directly over London and 2 millions Londoners
• Heathrow is not safe: chilling crash map
• Lobbies and lazy journalism
• Some Heathrow news...
• Essential reading: 2M Group on Heathrow Expansion
• Monday -my letter to the MP's against Heathrow Expansion
• Glad I managed to land... (and Heathrow expansion lies)
• BA can spam you but you can't spam BA!
• BAA caught lying... again.
• Stanstead and City granted expansion: what does it mean for Heathrow?
• And yet another broken promise by DfT and BAA...
• Is Heathrow really out of capacity?
• More on Heathrow
• Is sustainability sacrificed on the Heathrow altar?
• Transported logic
• Heathrow is not safe: chilling crash map
• Happy new year and more foul play from the DfT on Heathrow Expansion
• BAA wakes up to the sound of locomotives?
• Stating the obvious: Heathrow expansion will pollute more
• Heathrow is just dangerous where it is
• Hoon's farce as Heathrow expansion is announced
• Economic case for Heathrow expansion 'flawed'
• Finally, high speed train gets national coverage
• Just a reminder: London has FIVE airports, all competing against Amsterdam, Frankfurt and Paris
• More on Manor road and Heathrow
• Environmental perversity...
• Why is the governement pushing to increase number of night flights?
• Heathrow is dangerous and should not be expanded, here's why
• T5 opens, shows BAA-Government hypocrisy and collusion
• Lyon-Paris vs. Manchester-London (from Euroblog by Jon Worth)
• Airplanes noise common sense?
• Politics and GreenWash
• I dreamt about doing this!!!!

On the aviation consultation -lobbies hijacked a great opportunity to get it right

Lobbies have hijacked the aviation consultation, and it's a shame that prevents Britain to enter the 21st century when it comes to air travel.

Here are my comments to the Economist article:

Short sighted indeed... You forgot some other important considerations.
1. External costs.
LHR is in the worst place possible -a marshland that requires to fly over 2m people and space constrained.
2. Fragmentation.
All other capitals have consolidated and moved their hub airports, but for London no one's talking about CLOSING any.

3. Substitutes
No one is either seriously planning to offload shorthaul flights with HS2, even though Eurostar has 70% of passenger share between London and Paris.
In a nutshell: a botched consultation that's been hijacked by lobbies -in particular those using and owning Heathrow.

How often do plane stowaways fall from the sky?

The Beeb wakes up after under-reporting past cases with this article: BBC News - How often do plane stowaways fall from the sky? Interestingly enough, they don't answer the question.  I've done the maths though: it's one every four years. Just on Richmond borough.

List of reported stowaways reported on Heathrow-bound planes
Year	Provenance	Airline	Number	Condition	Impact/Retrival	Source
2010	Austria	Dubai royal family private jet	1	Alive	LHR	link
1996	India		2	Dead	Sainsbury's building site?	link
2012	South Africa	BA	1	Dead	LHR	link
2001	Bahrein	BA	1	Dead	Homebase car park, Richmond	link
2012			1	Dead	Portman avenue, East Sheen	link
2002	Ghana	Ghana Airways	2	Dead	LHR	link
2002	Ghana	BA		Dead		link
2000			1	Dead	Broadstone farm, Rudwick, Sussex?	link
2002	Uganda	DAS Air Cargo	1	Dead	LHR	link
2007					LHR

See my previous post on the subject:

• Stowaway death is a chilling reminder that the Heathrow runways point directly over London and 2 millions Londoners

Stowaway death is a chilling reminder that the Heathrow runways point directly over London and 2 millions Londoners

A stowaway fell on a Sheen road on Sunday:
UPDATE: 'I heard a monstrous bang', says woman after body found in street (From Richmond and Twickenham Times)

In 2001, a man fell from a British Airways Boeing 777 which was heading towards Heathrow and landed in a Homebase car park in Richmond.

Heathrow is in the wrong place, it's only a question of time before someone (or worse, a plane) falls on a house:
http://richmondtransits.blogspot.co.uk/2009/09/heathrow-is-not-safe-chilling-crash-map.html

Still waiting at the level crossing...

At the North Sheen station / Manor road this morning.

I'm not sure I understand the ambulance crew logic: if it's urgent, why go through a level crossing? If it's not, why the flashing lights?

Anyhow, just another life level crossings cost lives (and a reminder we're waiting for that footbridge promised by Susan Kramer MP)

See my previous posts on the level crossings.

I know where my vote will go...

It's a proposed cut I like: Tories 'would scrap third Heathrow runway' - UK Politics, UK - The Independent
The Right is greening, somewhat weird but nice.

We now have to make them promise this is more than just a pledge...

LHR, heathrowexpansion, BA, BAA, UK, rail, transportation, HS2, richmondtransits.blog

Heathrow is not safe: chilling crash map

Just found the web site of the Friends of the Earth on LHR T5 -a must read, there's also a chilling map by Hacan of possible crashes on Heathrow flight paths.

Stricken jumbo flew over West London (also there)

Campaigners against the expansion of Heathrow have long predicted that a disaster will eventually happen because more than 500 flights a day pass over Central London as they approach the airport.


The Government has proposed building a third runway at the airport, which would add 1,000 more flights a week over the capital. Most other big cities have positioned their airports in places that do not require planes to approach over the centre."


FOE comment. Heathrow is by far the most dangerous airport in the country for those on the ground. This is because there are far more planes flying over far more people than anywhere else. This fact is largely ignored by the government, which takes into account only 'individual risk' as opposed to 'societal risk'.

The AIB report is here (direct link to PDF).

See map of potential crash sites.

Update: Seems  Friends of the Earth moved to a proper website but did not migrate all files, this link doesn't work anymore. Fortunately,
Waybackmachine had an archived copy... Here's another link to the document, just in case.

Check also this post:Heathrow is just dangerous where it is

24/5/12 update: removed/changed dead hyperlinks.

Bring on High Speed Two, not more runways

Regular readers will know I think high-speed rail is a necessity. Today, on BBC.com there was an interesting statistic in this news article: Cities urge high-speed rail lin

Over 60 years, it is estimated that the line could save 30 million tonnes (29.5m tons) of CO2 worth £3.2bn by diverting passengers from air travel to rail.

Although 60 years can seem a very long time, rail infrastructure is ammortised over long periods. The real saving could be that a proper high-speed rail (HSR) network could avoid building more runways around London. I'm sure BAA thinks differently, but it worked just like that in France where TGV has displaced air travel on routes such as Paris to Nantes, Lyons, and even Marseilles.

Will this happen in the UK? I'm sceptical it will happen quickly, mostly because of the lack of proper planning, decentralised decision making and short-term focus.

UK, transportation, rail, railways, airlines, pollution, environment, train, richmondtransits.blog, HSR

BAA caught lying... again.

The list of BAA lies is very very long, Terminal 4 was going to be the last one, then it was Terminal 5 to be the last expansion, the planes noise data is based on theoritical levels and future emissions calculations are based on planes that don't exist.

The Advertising Standards Authority has caught them for the last one:
BBC NEWS | England | London | Heathrow noise claim 'misleading'

According to BAA, the Government said that a third runway would "would have to result in a Heathrow noise footprint no larger than with two runways in 2002, and that concentrations of nitrogen dioxide around Heathrow would have to be within the future EU limit."

So BAA would buy a brand new runway but not put extra planes on? Give me a break...

Read on this article on why they get away with it: BAA's close links with the DfT.

Concerns over their influence have been heightened by the presence of Tom Kelly, formerly the official spokesman for Tony Blair when he was prime minister, who has taken charge of "all aspects of BAA's communication activity" since being appointed as group director of corporate and public affairs for the company in late 2007, when the campaign for a third runway was in full swing. Kelly heads a network that plugs BAA directly into government and Labour, several of whose senior figures are involved in the pro-runway campaign. Julia Simpson, another former adviser to Blair, left Downing Street in 2007 for BA.

On the other side of the fence is Joe Irvin, former head of corporate affairs at BAA, who has switched to Number 10 to be a key adviser to Gordon Brown. Irvin was also involved with one of the main aviation lobby groups, Freedom to Fly, which was funded by BAA and BA - as was Stephen Hardwick, a former adviser to John Prescott and ex-head of public affairs at BAA. BAA also employs financial PR company Finsbury, which is headed by Roland Rudd, a close friend of business secretary Peter Mandelson, who was in favour of the third runway.

BA has fostered close links with government for years through PR firms Brunswick, headed by Gordon Brown's friend Alan Parker, and Lexington Communications, run by Mike Craven, a former Labour press chief. Senior Labour figures, paid to help the runway lobby funded by BAA, include Lord Soley, a former chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party, who has appeared in the media to promote the runway for Future Heathrow, one of the BAA-backed successors to Freedom to Fly.

The issue of Heathrow was tackled in a recent report on lobbying by the public administration select committee. After the inquiry, MPs concluded that lobbying needed to be open to public scrutiny. The report said: "There has also been widespread public concern that some areas of government policy have effectively been captured at an early stage by interest groups, usually within industry, and that public consultations have been unbalanced in the favour of these interests." It named Heathrow as an example of this.

BA, BAA, DfT, LHR, Heathrow, HeathrowExpansion, air, transportation, richmondtransits.blog

Traffic pandemonium: just a sign of things to come?

Thanks to Thames Water who shut the Northbound Clifford avenue section to replace aging water mains the A205 South Circular in Richmond (This Is Local London), combined with Transport For London who revamped Richmond Circus to add more car lanes but still no cycle lanes (I'll post again on this) plus some more water mains replacement in White Hart Lane, Richmond was totally grid locked this summer.

Great planning guys....

One of the fundamental issues is that our borough has the plight of being sectionned by a train line with only a few crossings: a bridge on the Quadrant, another one in Church lane, a level crossing in Manor Road, a bridge on Clifford avenue and then some more level crossings in Sheen Road by Mortlake train station, White Hart Lane in East Sheen/Mortlake, Vine Road in Barnes. There are then only three bridges before Putney, including on Dryburgh road -which is closed during rush hours...

I've been lobbying long to get a footbridge in North Sheen and believe level crossings are a problem in general, I'm not the only one it seems according to this BBC article:

More people die on level crossings than in derailments or train crashes, killing on average one person a month.

Network Rail says that every year 2,000 people are reported to misuse level crossings with motorists ignoring warning lights or weaving round barriers.

The National Union of Rail, Maritime, and Transport Workers Union (RMT) says that even crossings with barriers and warning systems are unsafe and should be replaced with bridges or underpasses over a period of ten years.

The bad news is that it's only going to get worse for local residents, with longer wait at crossings if BAA gets their way.

Yes, BAA, the London Heathrow airport operator who's wanting to put more planes overhead. Because they just figured out that Heathrow is poorly deserved by trains. No, not really, the truth is that they are trying to curb on car mouvements around the aiport in order to land more planes without breaching too much the European directive on air quality (thank god for the EU). Insane? Yes, but these are the facts.

So, if Airtrack goes ahead the trains frequency will double -from 8 to 16- with no or little benefits for local residents as it's far from certain the extra trains will stop in North Sheen for instance, while Manor Road will be continuously clogged with a traffic jam caused by the level crossing barriers being shut for 45 minutes in one hour!

This is obviously not acceptable, and this train line should be buried under street level from Putney to Richmond. Period.

Our MP Susan Kramer is running a petition: http://www.susankramer.org.uk/pages/airtrack.html. The consultation closes on 18 September.

Tags: air, BAA, Heathrow, Heathrowexpansion, LHR, rail, railways, North Sheen, level crossing, richmondtransits.blog

Is Britain about to jump on the high speed bandwagon?

Very exciting news today: BBC NEWS | Business | New high-speed rail plan unveiled

At long last, Network Rail has made a proposal for a second high speed line to link London to the Midlands and further North.
I do hope sincerely it's more than just talk, as high speed train is the best way to curb air pollution and give this country the transportation infrastructure it badly needs.
France had embarked in such a programme 25 years ago, and now train has the lion share in passenger numbers between Paris and London, Lyons, Marseilles, Nantes and even Bordeaux.

With Edinburgh only 2 hours from London, who needs to endure the hassle of flying?
And there's probably no need to expand airport capacity in London...

Unfortunately, it won't be before 2020...

UK, transportation, rail, railways, airlines, pollution, environment, train, richmondtransits.blog

A commuter's week...

This week, I'm wondering why we have to make do with third world infrastructures? Of course, we should have adequate sewage systems. Of course, we should not have level crossings in densely populated areas.

Monday: storm causes sewer discharge in Thames -900 thousand tonnes it seems.

Tuesday: the BCC pushes a reoport saying Heathrow must be expanded to add £30b to the economy. For me, I'm very sceptical of those hair raising figures pushed by the aviation lobby: "John Stewart, chairman of campaign group Hacan, argued that the report contradicted previous findings, saying the Government’s own figures suggested the benefits to the economy would be £5bn over 70 years."

Nothing about the indirect costs of course, no mention of alternatives such as shutting down 2, 3 or 4 airports around London to move them in the Estuary or developping high speed trains.

See my other posts on LHR Expansion.

Wednesday: train delayed because of incident at the White Hart Lane level crossing. Just like the one reported here:
Sheen Lane crossing most misused in Britain (From Richmond and Twickenham Times)

While I'm on about the level crossing, we may eventually get a level crossing in North Sheen -I've been campaigning for years and lobbying MP Susan Kramer. Not before 2010 it seems though....

In the meantime, schoolchildren will probably continue to jump it.

Still on about level crossings, our MP's met with Network rail, but with little results it seems.

See my previous posts on the level crossings.

UK, London, transportation, rail, railways, level, crossing, north, sheen, richmond, heathrow, heathrowexpansion, LHR, richmondtransits.blog

Monday -my letter to the MP's against Heathrow Expansion

I've bought in Greenpeace's airplot, genius idea, and still thanks to them, I've sent the following letter to the 57 MP's who have opposed Heathrow Expansion and will vote on this issue on Wednesday.

But as Gordon Brown, our un-elected Prime Minister, doesn't give a toss about democracy, this vote will be non-binding. It's important though to signal to the Labour party that this is a subject on which they will lose seats at the next general election: click here to act now.


Dear Sir,

As you will know, there is a debate and vote next Wednesday on the government’s plans to expand Heathrow with a third runway and a sixth terminal. You have already spoken out against Heathrow expansion, and now I urge you to vote with your conscience on Wednesday. I believe this goes beyond constituency matters and your vote will reflect how seriously our politicians are about tackling climate change.

The government has tried to dress this up as a ‘green’ runway, but nothing can change the fact that with a third runway, Heathrow would become the single biggest source of carbon emissions in the UK.

At the same time, the aviation industry doesn't pay any duty on kerosene -a flagrant injustice compared to the car owners who are taxed by every possible mean. House holders also receive no substantial grants or encouragements to "super-insulate" their homes.
Similarly, little is done to renew our coal power plants -the biggest source of greenhouse gasses by far- and invest in cleaner technologies.

The third runway decision severely threatens the government’s commitment to reduce carbon emissions by 80 per cent by 2050. It will worsen the already high pollution levels around the airport, and will provide little or no substantial economic benefit to Britain. With the challenges of climate change becoming more pressing, the government’s support for Heathrow expansion leaves its green credentials in tatters.

Opposition to the new runway grows rapidly. A recent poll of 6 Labour constituencies in west London showed that four would lose their seats and two would have their majority halved over the Heathrow issue. If the results were extrapolated across the entire area affected by expansion, Labour would lose many more seats.

Given the urgency of reducing our emissions and the challenge of realising it, I will be watching closely how you vote next Wednesday. The government’s response to tackling climate change is an important issue for me and one that will influence how I vote in the next election. I hope that your vote will be one for strong leadership on the green agenda, and against the third runway.


Tags:UK, politics, pollution, green, greenshouse, LHR, Heathrow, HeathrowExpansion, BAA, DfT, richmondtransits.blog

Essential reading: 2M Group on Heathrow Expansion

The 2M Group
has an excellent summary on the economics of Heathrow. No need to add much:

Current airport

• Fewer than 26% of users of Heathrow are travelling on Business(1).

•
35% of people travelling to Heathrow are interchange passengers – they
never leave the airport. Therefore they contribute little to the UK
economy outside of the aviation industry.

• 100,000 flights
a year, nearly a fifth of all flights, are to destinations in the UK or
near-Europe where there is already a viable rail alternative. There are
60 flights per day to Paris – more than any other destination. 36
flights a day go to Manchester, more than to Hong Kong or Chicago.

•
London’s airports handle 128 million passengers a year – that is more
than use the airports serving Paris and Frankfurt combined.

•
Ferrovial, the Spanish owners of Heathrow, make a substantial profit
from passengers using the airport. In the year since Ferrovial bought BAA (the operators of Heathrow) – capital investment fell by 15% but revenue grew from £1.077 billion to £1.232 billion.

Heathrow Expansion

• Only 1% of members of the Institute of Directors think airport expansion is a priority(2).

• 78% of London firms are against expansion at Heathrow(3).

• Fewer than a sixth of London firms would even consider leaving London if the airport did not expand(4).

Aviation generally

• £9 billion a year in tax subsidies is given to the aviation industry (It is zero-rated for VAT. It does not pay on fuel).

• Aviation fuel costs 26p a litre whereas petrol for cars is about £1 a litre.

•
£9 billion would pay for 22 new hospitals(5) – it cost £400 million to
build London’s University College Hospital – or 450,000 nurses (current
nursing positions advertised at £20,000(6).

• 89% of the general public think that businesses that create pollution should be more heavily taxed(7).

• 63% of the general public would be prepared to sacrifice one foreign holiday a year to save the planet(8).

• Only 17% of the general public are opposed to constraining growth in air-travel(9).

•
Tourists visiting the UK spend at least £15 billion pounds less per
year than UK tourists going on holiday overseas. Expanding aviation
simply means increasing the trade deficit for UK tourism.

LHR, BAA, HeathrowExpansion, richmondtransits.blog, ai, airlines, transportation

Just a reminder: London has FIVE airports, all competing against Amsterdam, Frankfurt and Paris

Read this
The Impossible Airport Dream? (Londonist)
and saw that
Frankfurt ready to fill Heathrow's shoes



(BBC)
this morning.

I find disappointing to see many mainstream media and blogs, relaying the main argument for Heathrow expansion: that, without it, Heathrow would be unable to compete against other European airports.

This is an easy argument to peddle, calls into National Pride and prevents the media from focussing on the fact the business case for the airport is tenuous at best.

As I've written many times in (before):

the DfT, BAA and BA are in collusion to preserve their own interests and not that of Londoners or the country

when they talk about Heathrow not being competitive compared to other European capitals, they conveniently forget that only London has FIVE international airports and that many other capitals have successfully relocated their airport"

Otherwise, it's good to see the Climate Sufragettes in action -watch this space.

BA, BAA, Heatrow, LHR, HeathrowExpansion, DfT, UK, politics, transportation, air, airlines, richmondtransits.blog, pollution

Hoon's farce as Heathrow expansion is announced

Geoff Hoon gave in the lobbies arguments and gave the Government's Go-ahead for new Heathrow runway.

His arguments are farcical for a lack of better words to describe their implausibility and the inadequacy of measures aimed at alleviating the impact of a third runway:

• The languge about the "the possibility of new high-speed rail links from the airport" means it's unlikely to happen. Same goes for the idea of "set[tting] up a company to look into creating a high speed rail line between London and Scotland - adding there was a "strong case" for a new high speed rail hub at Heathrow": it's just there to appease opponents.
  
• The 125,000 flights cap probably won't meet EU emissions regulations (thanks god to the European Union for making rules to protect citizens from their own government), even with his fictional "green planes"
  
• More passengers means more car traffic. The government's answer is to use hard shoulders. Brilliant, except anyone who's travelled on the M4 at peak hours knows that any little incident already causes a major congestion.
  

The only good news for Richmond residents was the concession to keep the "mixed mode" use of runways (plane noise only half of the day), however nothing on night fligts. But those living further West will be exposes to more takeoff noise thanks to the end of the Cranford agreement.

BAA and the DfT conveniently forget to state that there are FOUR other airports around London when making the case to expand Heathrow. An estuary airport would have been cheaper that T5 + T6 + a 4rd runway.

Finally, the economic case for LHR is based on un-proven assumptions.

Most major European countries have in the last 20 years:

• relocated their main airport
• invested in high-speed rail
• created multimodal nodes (air+rail)

During this time, British ones sat on their bottoms... (read also What if those who govern us had a long term view about strategic infrastructures?)

Here's the Decision text in full.

rail, trains, air, airways, BA, BAA, DfT, LHR, Heathrow, HeathrowExpansion, UK, politics, transportation, richmondtransits.blog

What if those who govern us had a long term view about strategic infrastructures?

I posted the following comments on this blog post of this morning:
The Toleration Of Public Transport on Jonathan MacDonald.com

These are the consequences of the refusal to invest in a proper public transportation system for 30 years: high prices and bad service.

They've tried to privatise and introduce competition, but the idea just doesn't work with infrastructure: you just can't make a profit, provide universal access, good interconnections and good service with redundant infrastructure.

If the government had taken a long term approach, the results could be:
- that the Eurostar platforms don't stand un-used for a year after they've innaugurated High Speed 1 and St Pancras International, when on the other hand trains are waiting for a platform on approach to Waterloo station
- that the Waterloo and City line would not be an isolated branch but would serve as a junction tunnel between the overground in Waterloo to the overground in Moorgate (strange that no one ever thought that trains could come from Reading / Portsmouth all the way to Stevenage / Cambridge)
- an airport in the estuary with 5 runways instead of 5 airports in dense conurbations, each with 1 or 2 runways
- a high-speed line to the Midlands and Scotland, with an interchange with the Eurostar
- Water pipes that are buried so that they don't freeze when the temperature drops

And so on... it's a long story of incompetence and short-sighted decisions.

UK, politics, transportation, trains, rail, ai, airways, BAA, DfT, richmondtransits.blog

Happy new year and more foul play from the DfT on Heathrow Expansion

Grim news this morning as the impact of the proposed Heathrow Expansion is worse than planned:
New flight paths for Heathrow will bring jets’ roar to millions - Times Online

As I wrote before, there are alternatives but it requires planning for the future (20 years ahead), something that the Government seems incapable of:

• BAA wakes up to the sound of locomotives?
• Some Heathrow news...

Heathrow, HeathrowExpansion, DfT, air, airways, BAA, UK, politics, transportation, rail, railways, richmondtransits.blog.uk

Stanstead and City granted expansion: what does it mean for Heathrow?

In the news yesterday:
Stansted and City airports get the expansion go ahead | Greenpeace UK

So, where does that leave us?

It looks like the government (and the councils) are not serious about the green agenda but are rather happy to listen to the aviation lobbies.

Heathrow expansion (the current plan is a third runway between the A4 and M4, requiring to bulldoze 700 homes, effectively razing Sipson) is probably the most controversial: because it's the busiest airport but also the worst location (Westerly winds prevalence means its flight paths send planes droning over no less than 2 MILLIONS of residents.
The most enraging is that both the Government (the Dft) and BAA have been consistently lying and breaking promises over the years.

I think the solution is to do what worked elsewhere: instead of talking about Heathrow not being competitive compared to
other European capitals, conveniently forgeting that only London has
FIVE international airports, the DfT should plan (do they know the meaning of the word though?) ahead and do what many other capitals done by relocating their airport.
Of course, they should also invest in rail: read Lyon-Paris vs. Manchester-London (from Euroblog by Jon Worth)


Read also:

• Stating the obvious: Heathrow expansion will pollute more
• Some Heathrow news...
• Listen to the Heathrow expansion lobbies...

heathrow, heathrowexpansion, LHR, air, airlines, transportation, UK, richmondtransits.blog, environment, pollution