About The Two Airports With Problem:
London Heathrow Airport
London Heathrow Airport or Heathrow (IATA: LHR, ICAO: EGLL) is a major international airport serving London, England. Located in the London Borough of Hillingdon, in West London, Heathrow is the busiest airport in the United Kingdom and the third busiest airport in the world (as of 2012) in terms of total passenger traffic, handling more international passengers than any other airport around the globe. It is also the busiest airport in Europe by passenger traffic and the third busiest by traffic movements, with a figure surpassed only by Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport and Frankfurt Airport. Heathrow is the primary hub for British Airways and the primary operating base for Virgin Atlantic.
London Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport (IATA: LGW, ICAO: EGKK) is located 3.1 mi (5.0 km) north of the centre of Crawley, West Sussex, and 29.5 mi (47.5 km) south of Central London. Also known as London Gatwick, it is London's second largest international airport and second busiest by total passenger traffic in the United Kingdom after Heathrow. Furthermore, Gatwick is Europe's leading airport for point-to-point flights and has the world's busiest single-use runway with up to 53 aircraft movements per hour in late-2012 and a maximum capacity of 55 movements per hour. Its two terminals – North and South – cover an area of 98,000 m2 (1,050,000 sq ft) and 160,000 m2 (1,700,000 sq ft) respectively. In 2012, 34.2 million passengers passed through Gatwick.
London Heathrow Airport or Heathrow (IATA: LHR, ICAO: EGLL) is a major international airport serving London, England. Located in the London Borough of Hillingdon, in West London, Heathrow is the busiest airport in the United Kingdom and the third busiest airport in the world (as of 2012) in terms of total passenger traffic, handling more international passengers than any other airport around the globe. It is also the busiest airport in Europe by passenger traffic and the third busiest by traffic movements, with a figure surpassed only by Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport and Frankfurt Airport. Heathrow is the primary hub for British Airways and the primary operating base for Virgin Atlantic.
London Gatwick Airport
Gatwick Airport (IATA: LGW, ICAO: EGKK) is located 3.1 mi (5.0 km) north of the centre of Crawley, West Sussex, and 29.5 mi (47.5 km) south of Central London. Also known as London Gatwick, it is London's second largest international airport and second busiest by total passenger traffic in the United Kingdom after Heathrow. Furthermore, Gatwick is Europe's leading airport for point-to-point flights and has the world's busiest single-use runway with up to 53 aircraft movements per hour in late-2012 and a maximum capacity of 55 movements per hour. Its two terminals – North and South – cover an area of 98,000 m2 (1,050,000 sq ft) and 160,000 m2 (1,700,000 sq ft) respectively. In 2012, 34.2 million passengers passed through Gatwick.
What's the problem?
The problem with these two London Airports are expansion.
London Heathrow Airport's owner planned to build a 2,220 meter third runway north of the two runways which one of them is almost 4 kilometers and one which is 3.3 kilometers long. They also planned to build a sixth terminal building to accommodate more airlines. These two plans was cancelled because of opposition.
London Gatwick Airport is also waiting for their plans to be approved. They are planning also a second runway and a new terminal in the middle of the old runway and new runway.
There are also plans replace the Heathrow Airport with a new airport in the Thames estuary in London. It can be located in an artificial island called Boris Island named after City of London Mayor Boris Johnson or in different other areas in the Thames Estuary.
Here are the advantages of making Thames Estuary the main airport:
Here are the disadvantages:
London Heathrow Airport's owner planned to build a 2,220 meter third runway north of the two runways which one of them is almost 4 kilometers and one which is 3.3 kilometers long. They also planned to build a sixth terminal building to accommodate more airlines. These two plans was cancelled because of opposition.
London Gatwick Airport is also waiting for their plans to be approved. They are planning also a second runway and a new terminal in the middle of the old runway and new runway.
There are also plans replace the Heathrow Airport with a new airport in the Thames estuary in London. It can be located in an artificial island called Boris Island named after City of London Mayor Boris Johnson or in different other areas in the Thames Estuary.
Here are the advantages of making Thames Estuary the main airport:
- Flights could arrive and depart 24 hours.
- The airport is connected directly to the Channel Tunnel railway services, replacing the demand on short European flights with more efficient train service which reduces CO2 emissions by 10 times per journey.
- The new airport would be located over water and not land, so reduces the risks related to Emergency landing in densely populated urban areas or concerns over Mid-air collision at overloaded runways.
- Use of the existing infrastructure such as high-speed rail line and expanded 8 lane M25/M2 will require far less public funding and less complex to adapt than in London for Heathrow Airport rail and road upgrades.
- Would negate the need for a controversial third runway at London Heathrow Airport, or a second runway at London Gatwick Airport and London Stansted Airport
- Offshore island can be easily expanded and new barrier will help to control floodplain.
- The cost of the airport development will be absorb by the cost to include a new Thames Barrier that will generate power using hydropower turbines.
- A high speed rail link to London with a journey time of around 20 minutes would encourage more passengers to reach the airport using public transport. Objectors point to the possibility that a high speed rail link to Heathrow could also be built. However, such a link would require expensive tunnelling under London, and was costed in July 2008 at £4.5bn.[26]
- A high speed rail link to the nearby High Speed 1 would make London's airport a more suitable hub for north-western continental Europe: closer, and easier to reach.
- Crossrail could be extended easily to connect the new airport.
- Eurostar could be accessed easily via the new airport.
- Under the Shivering Sands proposal, it would be possible to reach the airport from terminals in both Kent and Essex, diminishing the amount of new traffic and congestion imposed on either county.
- New flight paths to the new airport will reduce the impact on air and noise pollution over London by huge volumes.
- Regeneration of the deprived Thames Gateway.
- Release of 2,500 acres (10 square kilometers) of prime land at Heathrow, close to the M4 and with excellent rail links, highly suitable for housing redevelopment.
- Flexible approach for future expansion, such as new runways or Virgin Galactic type development.
- Possible direct connection with Central London using high speed catamarans as a new state-of-the-art tourist attraction.
- The development and running of the airport would create tens of thousands of jobs.
- Possibility to be used as a hub for international cruise liners, utilizing the high speed connections from all over the UK and Europe.
- The new airport will connect air, rail, sea and motorway transport within a single hub, excellent for transport and to import/export product from the island.
- The project could be largely financed by private investors.
Here are the disadvantages:
- It would require major investment in local infrastructure (roads, railways, schools, hospitals) in order to service the tens of thousands of employees at a major airport.
- There would be considerable upheaval involved in moving London's main airport to a new location, though other major cities have successfully moved their main airport, including Paris (1974), Singapore (1981), Jakarta (1985), Munich (1992), Denver (1995), Oslo (1998), Hong Kong (1998), Kuala Lumpur (1998), Athens (2001), and Bangkok (2006). (Other cities, such as Berlin and Montreal, have had difficulty with such a transition.)
- There would be significant job losses at Heathrow, and knock-on impacts to the economy of west London.
- Fog would be a key difficulty to overcome for a possible hub airport. In 2012, the Met Office concluded that the Thames Estuary was 'three times' more foggy than Heathrow. Fog and snow frequently affects flights at Heathrow, forcing aircraft to leave more space for take-off and landing due to low visibility. Whereas Thames estuary airport could transfer travellers by Eurostar and new fog guidance systems can be used to overcome these issues, however Heathrow have not yet installed them.
- The construction costs of the airport alone would be large, estimated at £11.5bn for Cliffe, and £3.5bn more for an offshore island scheme.
- There would be large costs for constructing road and rail access to the airport. These were estimated at £1.8bn for Cliffe, including two rail connections to High Speed 1, a road tunnel under the Thames to Benfleet, largely to access the south east Essex labour market, and other road and rail connections. Heathrow rely on public transport and funding for transport infrastructure, major upgrades are also required and need to considered for rail & motorways.
- Proposals rely on using capacity on High Speed 1, however currently only uses under 10% of its full potential.
- Building an artificial offshore island can be expanded however is time-consuming, adding 3 to 5 years to the construction time.
- There is a risk of bird strike, higher for coastal sites, lower for offshore sites.
- The level of demand for an airport in the Thames estuary is uncertain, and may require government intervention to force airlines to use it.
- Building a major new airport to expand capacity may encourage more flights, and thereby increase emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases, unless channel tunnel is connected to replace many flights.
- The presence of the wreck of the SS Richard Montgomery, which has around 1,400 tons of explosives on board. A safe way to remove the wreck, present since 1944, has not yet been found.
- It would require a radical upgrade to the current flight patterns which are based on 1970s patterns, and the proximity to Dutch and Belgian airspace may cause knock-on effects in other countries if not planned properly like Heathrow.
- The South East of England (SE) is already highly developed, with a population density reported (in 2011) as the third (or sixth, by other criteria) most dense in the world. Many areas of the SE already have three or four layers of audible air traffic over them.
- The location would be more difficult to access from the rest of the country compared to Heathrow.
- Building the airport would destroy the habitat of thousands of wetland birds.
- The airport would be placed in the flight path of 4 of London's 5 major airports (Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, and London-City.)
- A recent report by the South East Local Enterprise Partnership concluded that the proposed Thames Estuary airport would be too expensive and take too long to address loss of air traffic in the UK and expanding existing airports may be the only short-term solution.
Our Solution:
Our solutions came in. London's plans to make the Thames Estuary Airport is very expensive costing more than a billion euros including land filling, construction of runways, removal of a shipwreck with thousands of explosives, and many more. For us, we may cancel the construction making the the London Heathrow and Gatwick Airports stay in their positions.
Our evidences state that London Heathrow has many short-haul European destinations but London Heathrow is focused on long-haul flights such as trans-atlantic flights, Afro-Asian flights and Australian flights.
Because of London Heathrow's longer runways, we decide to let London Heathrow have the medium-haul and long-haul flights with some short-haul flights using jumbo wide-body aircraft from Boeing 777 (mini jumbo) flights to Airbus A380 (super jumbo) flights.
While London Gatwick shall hold most short-haul flights and selected long-haul trans-Atlantic flights (such as American Airlines' Raleigh-Durham B767-200ER services).
London Stansted and London Luton may hold other short-haul to medium-haul flights.
London City will hold special flights with Embraer aircraft, propeller and A318 aircraft from BA and CityJet unlike other airports.
Here are the expansion plans:
London Heathrow Airport
Our evidences state that London Heathrow has many short-haul European destinations but London Heathrow is focused on long-haul flights such as trans-atlantic flights, Afro-Asian flights and Australian flights.
Because of London Heathrow's longer runways, we decide to let London Heathrow have the medium-haul and long-haul flights with some short-haul flights using jumbo wide-body aircraft from Boeing 777 (mini jumbo) flights to Airbus A380 (super jumbo) flights.
While London Gatwick shall hold most short-haul flights and selected long-haul trans-Atlantic flights (such as American Airlines' Raleigh-Durham B767-200ER services).
London Stansted and London Luton may hold other short-haul to medium-haul flights.
London City will hold special flights with Embraer aircraft, propeller and A318 aircraft from BA and CityJet unlike other airports.
Here are the expansion plans:
London Heathrow Airport
Worldlink Airlines Group optimized the use of the area between Terminal 5 (British Airways and Iberia) and the other terminals with a 2.1 kilometer (boxed with yellow color) runway that could stretch perpendicular through the two runways available making 3 runways.
Worldlink Airlines Group also optimized the construction of an additional terminal in the middle of the new runway and Terminal 4 or extending Terminal 4 in that area too. While hangars and cargo terminals will be moved in an area between A4 and A30.
Terminal 5 Satellite will be extended to full length to accommodate 6 million more passengers annually.
London Gatwick Airport
Worldlink Airlines Group also optimized the construction of a new runway 1.5 kilometer beside the main runway. The new terminal in "What's The Problem?" section will be done. This terminal will be almost as big as the London Heathrow Terminal 5 (without Satellite C).
There will be also additional terminals here.
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London Gatwick and London Heathrow will be also connected with mass railways similar to large trains that connect countries of Europe using the Heathwick design.
Worldlink Airlines Group also optimized the construction of an additional terminal in the middle of the new runway and Terminal 4 or extending Terminal 4 in that area too. While hangars and cargo terminals will be moved in an area between A4 and A30.
Terminal 5 Satellite will be extended to full length to accommodate 6 million more passengers annually.
London Gatwick Airport
Worldlink Airlines Group also optimized the construction of a new runway 1.5 kilometer beside the main runway. The new terminal in "What's The Problem?" section will be done. This terminal will be almost as big as the London Heathrow Terminal 5 (without Satellite C).
There will be also additional terminals here.
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London Gatwick and London Heathrow will be also connected with mass railways similar to large trains that connect countries of Europe using the Heathwick design.
Finalized Airlines in Each Airport:
All data below are just preferred by Worldlink Airlines Group.
Airlines may choose their own airport whether Heathrow or Gatwick.
Airlines may choose their own airport whether Heathrow or Gatwick.
London Heathrow Airport
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London Gatwick Airport
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