How many airports does each of those cities have? As a reference point
London has:

From what you count as London I'd say Paris has Orly, Beauvais-Tillé, Le
Bourget Charles de Gaulle, and Châlons Vatry.

Ask EasyJet or Ryan Air and you'll get a very different answer from that
you'd get from the senior managers of a global business But I
suggest you ask such managers what they think makes for a potential
regional[1] business base before you expect them to count Gatwick etc in
thr mix.


[1] Regional on the scale of eg Europe, Europe + Asia etc




--
Robin
reply to address is (meant to be) valid

In article , (Robin) wrote:

How many airports does each of those cities have? As a reference
point London has:

From what you count as London I'd say Paris has Orly, Beauvais-Tillé,
Le Bourget Charles de Gaulle, and Châlons Vatry.

Ask EasyJet or Ryan Air and you'll get a very different answer from
that you'd get from the senior managers of a global business But
I suggest you ask such managers what they think makes for a potential
regional[1] business base before you expect them to count Gatwick etc
in thr mix.


[1] Regional on the scale of eg Europe, Europe + Asia etc

They aren't being very rational then. The time to Gatwick from central
London is as good as that to Heathrow, especially if you don't pay the
extortionate fares on Heathrow Express.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

"tim....." wrote:
"Recliner" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 2 Sep 2014 10:22:49 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:

In message
,
at 02:36:55 on Tue, 2 Sep 2014, Recliner
remarked:
Having lived through the "Third airport" debacle, where unless I'm very
much mistaken the result was expanding the biggest existing shortlisted
airport (and rejecting otherwise preferred but more expensive builds), I
wouldn't be surprised to see Gatwick being chosen for the "next new runway".

By that logic, surely Heathrow would be chosen?

Lots of local opposition, and much more expensive.

True, but also much, much more demand for it. Apart from Gatwick
airport itself, not many people are demanding a second runway there.
Pretty much the entire business community and airline industry want
Heathrow to expand.

That's because they've all bought into the fiction that it will mean
there is space for daily flights to Ulan Bator (insert list of other out
of the way places that only 3 people a week want to travel to) thus
increasing the trade that we do with um, Mongolia.

Frankfurt already has direct flights to Ulaanbaatar. If there's enough
business to justify flights from London, why shouldn't they be offered? If
not, they obviously won't be. The point is that the market should decide,
without artificial restraints.


But IMHO the extra capacity wont be used this way. It'll be used to
increase the number of flights a day to NYC from 30 to 60 to no-ones
benefit except BA/AA/Etc

That's your fantasy, not what the market is telling us. If there was a
market for a lot more NYC flights, they would already be running from
Gatwick, Stansted, etc. If it's to no-one's benefit apart from the
airlines, who are these numerous mystery passengers who would pay through
the nose to fly from Heathrow, despite your claim that they'd be gaining no
benefit? The airlines only want to offer more flights because they see a
market for them. Why do you think you know better than them?

In reality, US flights from Stansted have been tried and repeatedly failed,
and airlines are reluctant to route them from Gatwick, apart from the
leisure flights to Orlando and Vegas. There probably is demand for more US
flights from LHR, but to secondary cities not already served, rather than
to NYC, which is already well-served. BA is doing well with its new Austin
flight and is looking to add more new destinations, not yet more flights on
already well-served routes.

wrote:
In article , (Robin) wrote:

How many airports does each of those cities have? As a reference
point London has:

From what you count as London I'd say Paris has Orly, Beauvais-Tillé,
Le Bourget Charles de Gaulle, and Châlons Vatry.

Ask EasyJet or Ryan Air and you'll get a very different answer from
that you'd get from the senior managers of a global business But
I suggest you ask such managers what they think makes for a potential
regional[1] business base before you expect them to count Gatwick etc
in thr mix.


[1] Regional on the scale of eg Europe, Europe + Asia etc

They aren't being very rational then. The time to Gatwick from central
London is as good as that to Heathrow, especially if you don't pay the
extortionate fares on Heathrow Express.

Many Heathrow passengers come from locations other than Central London. I
live in West London, and Heathrow is far more convenient than any other
airport. Gatwick is only good for people near Victoria or Thameslink
stations.

In article
,
(Recliner) wrote:

wrote:
In article , (Robin)
wrote:

How many airports does each of those cities have? As a reference
point London has:

From what you count as London I'd say Paris has Orly, Beauvais-Tillé,
Le Bourget Charles de Gaulle, and Châlons Vatry.

Ask EasyJet or Ryan Air and you'll get a very different answer from
that you'd get from the senior managers of a global business But
I suggest you ask such managers what they think makes for a potential
regional[1] business base before you expect them to count Gatwick etc
in thr mix.


[1] Regional on the scale of eg Europe, Europe + Asia etc

They aren't being very rational then. The time to Gatwick from
central London is as good as that to Heathrow, especially if you
don't pay the extortionate fares on Heathrow Express.

Many Heathrow passengers come from locations other than Central London. I
live in West London, and Heathrow is far more convenient than any other
airport. Gatwick is only good for people near Victoria or Thameslink
stations.

Not so. Gatwick is as convenient to get to and from as Heathrow for us in
Cambridge.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

wrote:
In article
,
(Recliner) wrote:

wrote:
In article , (Robin)
wrote:

How many airports does each of those cities have? As a reference
point London has:

From what you count as London I'd say Paris has Orly, Beauvais-Tillé,
Le Bourget Charles de Gaulle, and Châlons Vatry.

Ask EasyJet or Ryan Air and you'll get a very different answer from
that you'd get from the senior managers of a global business But
I suggest you ask such managers what they think makes for a potential
regional[1] business base before you expect them to count Gatwick etc
in thr mix.


[1] Regional on the scale of eg Europe, Europe + Asia etc

They aren't being very rational then. The time to Gatwick from
central London is as good as that to Heathrow, especially if you
don't pay the extortionate fares on Heathrow Express.

Many Heathrow passengers come from locations other than Central London. I
live in West London, and Heathrow is far more convenient than any other
airport. Gatwick is only good for people near Victoria or Thameslink
stations.

Not so. Gatwick is as convenient to get to and from as Heathrow for us in
Cambridge.

But presumably Stansted is far better than either? Isn't Heathrow quicker
to access than Gatwick today? Of course, after the Thameslink project is
finally complete, Gatwick should be more convenient, though Heathrow will
be quicker, via a change to Crossrail at Farringdon.

I must admit I'm surprised by how relatively unpopular Gatwick is compared
to Heathrow, given that it's located in a prosperous area between London
and Brighton, and has both good rail and road links. Heathrow isn't a
better airport to fly through, so it must be the magnetic attraction of a
hub airport.

My imminent next trip puts both to the test: LHR T5 to Hamburg, returning
via Venice to Gatwick North. The following trip is from Heathrow to Bilbao,
but I have to use a rare Heathrow LCC as BA and Iberia don't fly to Bilbao.
The next two trips suffer through the UK's lack of a large hub airport, as
I have to fly via Amsterdam to Quito, and then via Bangkok to Yangon. I'll
try and ensure that my first 2015 trip uses direct flights from Heathrow.

wrote:

I don't fly more than once every few years, and I try and use public
transport where possible. So I might not be at the top of the moral high
ground but I suspect I'm higher up than most. And good luck buying a house
in a city centre these days.

I seem to remember you showing off about never having cars with less than 3
litre engines, and avoiding public transport whenever possible?

And it's tough if you're afraid of flying, but others need to.

wrote:
On Tue, 2 Sep 2014 12:01:02 +0100
"Robin" wrote:
Logic actually favours no expansion at all. The much quoted hub
airport
will do nothing for UK Plc other than put more money into the pockets
of
the airport owners and will be an enviromental disaster wherever its
located. But of course as soon as someone says this you get the usual
vested interests shouting them down saying they're anti business and
banging on about "growth".

So all those other countries/cities[1] which have developed 4-runway[2]
airports are stupid?

How many airports does each of those cities have? As a reference point
London has:

Heathrow
Gatwick
Luton
Stansted
City
Southend

And people honestly believe we need even more capacity. Its a ****ing joke.

I know you don't understand the value of a hub airport, but the demand is
for more hub capacity, not more capacity in the other airports. London does
have spare capacity at some of its single runway airports, but Heathrow is
bursting at the seams.

wrote:
On Tue, 02 Sep 2014 11:44:10 +0100
Recliner wrote:
On Tue, 02 Sep 2014 10:41:33 GMT, d wrote:

On Tue, 02 Sep 2014 10:44:46 +0100
Recliner wrote:
On Tue, 2 Sep 2014 10:22:49 +0100, Roland Perry
True, but also much, much more demand for it. Apart from Gatwick
airport itself, not many people are demanding a second runway there.
Pretty much the entire business community and airline industry want
Heathrow to expand.

Which "entire business community" would this be then? Give some examples.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/...ick-airport-ex
ansion

The CBI is a private political lobbying organisation that represents a small
fraction of businesses in this country.

Got a proper example?

Perhaps the Royal Company of Self-Employed Contract Programmers Who Don't
Fly Very Often has a view?

In message , at 18:13:17
on Tue, 2 Sep 2014, remarked:

The time to Gatwick from central London is as good as that to Heathrow,
especially if you don't pay the extortionate fares on Heathrow Express.

Just being on the tube map helps a lot, psychologically, to make people
want to choose Heathrow.

--
Roland Perry