3rd Runway at Heathrow

I think its going to be at least 2/3 yrs before a final final decision is made and at least another 10yrs for planning and building so plenty of time for a change of government and another change of mind as has happened numerous times before.
I see Zac Goldsmith has stuck by his pledge to resign and stand as an independent makes a change for a politician to do what he says.

I live close to Heathrow although not under the flight path so will be impacted by many of the problems you mention. In all honestly I don't think it will happen in my lifetime. I feel sorry for those affected more than I.

Both Heathrow & Gatwick are at 98% capacity so I guess something has to be done unless the UK turns away business. Custom is forecast to be expanding in the Far East/Indian subcontinent and those people will only want to go to London.

My son lives under a Heathrow flight path now but he isn't bothered one way or the other.

How refreshing to hear about someone directly affected who isn't complaining - good for you, SueDonim's son!

We used to live under the flight path and you tend to tune it out (apart from Concorde which was always noisy).

However, I did worry about the DC and the pollution.

I feel very sorry for people who will lose their homes, but the same will happen if HS2 goes ahead.

Is there much fuss/demonstrations etc in other countries when these proposals are put forward?

Ana he says it's the price you pay for living close to all the benefits of London. It means we have easy (if not cheap) access to visit because we live in Scotland and sometimes fly down to see him and his family. It's a cheap taxi ride away.

The people who will lose their homes will be paid 25% over and above the price of their houses, so at least, although a shame that they will have to move, at least they will be well recompensed. Anyone buying a house under the flightpath of Heathrow knows what it will be like.We have to have either a new runway at Heathrow or Gatwick , people need to travel here and also from here. Since it's London that most business people want to come to....something has to give.

My situation is similar to tanith's- I do not live under the flight path and I will be amazed if it is finished in my lifetime. Something had to be done, it is a pity that the wheels cannot move faster.

SueD is right, if you live in London there's a price to be paid for having all the benefits. We now have night tubes rattling past at the weekend and yes, at first we were kept awake, but you get used to anything. Same for the airport.

I' m glad it's not Gatwick which is completely the wrong side of London for most of the country. I had hoped it wouldn't go ahead and there'd be some money to develop Stansted. There was a phone in on You and Yours today and the only people who seemed to be in favour were those in the industry. Everyone else was appealing for more development of regional airports. As has been said it's not likely to happen in our lifetime but I do feel it's too London-centric. I don't understand why the big airlines refuse to use other airports such as Doncaster and try to develop the north.

There hasn't been a new runway at Heathrow for many years and the world was very different and not globalised as it is now. I think there is a need for expansion at either Heathrow or Gatwick. I appreciate people living near Heathrow are upset but they knew they were buying a house near an airport and most people knew noise was a risk. It's also noisy living near a main road or a train line.
If we want to keep London as a global city, whether within the EU or out, surely we need airport expansion. I don't think this will make much difference to pollution, which is already bad in London.

What a sensible post, GrandmaMoira, I agree with you.

NfkDumpling Whats the point of big airlines using other airports when the capacity is needed for people wanting to come to London. We don't like it anymore than you do but its a fact and I agree with others who've said its a price we pay to live here.

I am getting ready to duck beneath the parapet now.

I do not think we should expand air transport anywhere anytime. It is killing our planet and draining resources and the time has come to stand back and think about how we use this luxury. Many journeys are totally unnecessary: modern media means that most business transactions and negotiations can take place by various electronic means. The use of air transport for holidays has got totally out of hand - we have to change our perspective and cease to expect to be able to travel where we want when we want. Freight is I think a different matter - more use of air transport for freight makes sense.

Try this link: www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2014/aviation-100-years

Take a look at the mass coverage of the globe by air traffic at every instant and stop and think about the aviation fuel that is being used. It is truly horrifying.

Just building a brick wall for me to hide behind!

I heard that most of the expansion at Heathrow is to cope with increased traffic internally.
Improving the railways would be cheaper and quicker.
I agree with you, Lucky. If enough join us, we won't need that wall.

That link looks a bit worrying. There's no room for more planes in Europe.

I'm against it on many levels. The mayor of London and most London MPs are against it. If they want to open up the north etc why not go to Birmingham or Manchester? And encourage less air travel? ii have a feeling it won't happen in a hurry.

This is what is going to happen:

Yabber, yabber, yabber, yabber, yabber, yabber, yabber, yabber, yabber....

Then, half a generation or so further down the line, one of three things will happen:
1 It'll be built because it really is needed for the good of the country's economy,
2. it won't be built because it isn't needed,
3. there'll be another decade of yabber, yabber.

I was born just down the road from Sipson/Harmondsworth the area which will be affected by this. When I was three my parents moved to the South West side of the airport. At that time the airfield was only used by the RAF and the whole area had many anti-aircraft lights mounted there. I watched the growth of the airport from a few Nissan huts (serving as the arrivals and departure lounges) along the Bath Road side (A4) to what it is today. Neither of my parents work had anything to do with the airport.

Watching the airport grow was exciting - we initially could walk from Hatton Cross to Harlington Corner along a track - which had been the old road. I used to hope an aircraft would come into land - it always felt that you could reach up and touch it. The infrastructure around the airport took years to have in place and it is now well served. As has been said a majority of the people travelling to the airport want to go there or they are changing planes there - unfortunately they do not wish to go to the east and Gatwick and even less northwards to Stansted. As big as it is I think there are many even larger airports about in Europe.

If this Brexit goes ahead then the UK will need as much trade - whether in people travelling or goods - as it can get and that all needs to be served. It used to annoy us intensely when people who had moved to the area after the airport was built and indeed worked there or in a connected industry started complaining about noise/pollution etc. When I was a child the airport had planes landing and leaving all night long - that is no longer the case and neither do the maintenance people test the jet engines all night long - that is far worse than the normal in and out flights. As to Concorde - it was noisy but it was so quick that by the time you registered the noise it was far away - looking truly beautiful as it went on its way.

As has been said if you want to be near the hub of things etc there is a price to pay - just as there is by living deep in the country where there are few amenities.

My parents used to love watching Concorde ,it flew.across.their. kitchen window view every day. You do get used to the planes in West London. I once went to a party in the 60s in a house by the airport. I remember the ungodly screech and the sight of the passengers going past the upstairs widows.

It is wonderful to be able to fly anywhere in the world, but at what cost?

At what cost indeed.

I suppose the same was said about busses and trains in the beginning too.

Buses, trains and cars are of course also polluters, but planes are in a different league.

"........ the problem is not just that planes burn a lot of fuel and therefore kick out plenty of CO2 per passenger. Just as important are a host of other high-altitude impacts, including vapour trails and ozone production, that are usually estimated to cause as much warming as the CO2 itself.
.......although air travel accounts for only a small fraction of global emissions (relatively few people can afford to fly), one transatlantic flight can add as much to your carbon footprint as a typical year's worth of driving."

It is also about depleting the world's resources of oil.

Many business trips amount to a bit of a jolly and the same result could have been achieved electronically.

One of the big problems of transport planning is that you do not really know what is around the corner. I am sure that when we started to criss-cross the planet with roads it was done in response to the invention of the car; if we were to look back on it and realise what trouble we were brewing in terms of pollution and environmental destruction, maybe we would have developed different ideas, or have developed rail networks more. But once the road network is there, then car production increases and so on......

Sorry, Luckygirl many, if not most, business trips do not involve a bit of a jolly, nor can the meetings be undertaken online.

DH is an engineer in the energy industry, first hydrocarbons, now wind farms. He has to be on site to check that work is done properly and safely. You cannot engineer from a distance. He has flown all over the world, including to countries liked the Congo, Angola, Sudan and I can assure you that 99.999% of his journeys and those of the many, many working engineers, technical experts, overseas sales staff and negotiators, who make the majority of business travelers are certainly not jollies.

Unless you are a board member of one of the top 100 companies in the world you travel economy, stay in international hotel chains with whom your employer has struck a deal, providing its employers occupy the back rooms overlooking the dustbins. He has twice been in real fear of his life, twice been taken to hospital on business trips, fortunately in countries with high medical standards, but it is no fun knowing your DH is in a hospital in a country 8,000 miles away where neither he nor you speak the language and few of its nationals speak English.

His business trips have occasionally involved jollies, a few more might have helped coped with the long uncertain absences and concern about unpleasant countries and, sometimes, dangerous work.

I was amazed last night when watching the One Show to see how a surgeon could use a smart phone on a selfie stick to tell other surgeons how to save a man's life in Syria.

It would be interesting to know how many business trips are necessary. I am sure much the flying that Theresa May has done since Brexit could have been done away with by having meetings electronically, as Luckygirl said.