Secretary of State for Transport, Ruth Kelly today (22 November) published a consultation document on increasing capacity at Heathrow airport.
The consultation, ”Adding Capacity at Heathrow Airport” examines whether a third runway could be built and a sixth terminal with access to the road and rail network.
This would enable the airport to handle around 700,000 flights a year ” up from the current 480,000 movements
”Heathrow supports 170,000 jobs, billions of pounds of British exports and is our main gateway to the global economy,” said Kelly.
”If nothing changes, Heathrow”s status as a world-class airport will be gradually eroded ” jobs will be lost and the economy will suffer.”
Kelly has called upon the public to respond to the consultation with their views, whether in agreement or not with the analysis and also on possible changes to the airport”s operation.
Kelly added, ”I am clear that any decision on expansion has to be compatible with meeting tough local environmental tests on noise and air quality. I fully understand this is an issue which raises strong feelings on all sides which is why we are making every effort to encourage people to make their views known.”
Already opinions have been made regarding the future of Heathrow, some for expansion and some against.
”Expansion is vitally important to the millions of families who rely on affordable air transport to visit friends and family abroad or who go on holiday occasionally,” said Flyingmatters chairman, Brian Wilson.
”Without expansion at Heathrow, alongside growth at the UK”s other regional airports, tightly constrained capacity will mean higher prices ” with some families facing the prospect in future years of being priced out of flying all together. That would be socially regressive and politically unacceptable,” he added.
But a contrary view was clearly expressed by Campaign for Better Transport spokesman, Jason Torrance: ”Any plan for the future expansion of Heathrow must be abandoned and money instead put into high speed rail links.”
The closing date for responses to the consultation is 27 November 2008 and final policy decisions will be taken in 2008.