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... Why do they hate it??
Transferring between terminals is quite a chore as well apparently.
What we should be focusing on is much tighter caps through the EU carbon trading scheme, if this was in place then businesses will start to see carbon as a cost on their balance sheets and it will become profitable to cut CO2. Until that we are just pissing about arguing about a distraction.
I'm not trying to talk 'big' - to me what I'm saying is fairly common sense, if someone arrives at an Airport and has another flight out an hour later they don't do anything major to add to the economy, maybe buy a drink or something - they aren't adding millions of pounds into UK business at the Airport. Items of high value bought tend to be 'duty free' with no tax revenue to the Government. It's common sense.
As for the point about Air fares going up, its basic supply and demand, you'll end up with slightly less flights and slightly less pollution/emissions.
Agreed. As I mentioned a couple of pages back T3 -> T5 involved two trains, and a multitude of escalators, lifts and walkways taking about 30 mins.
... Well your Commonsense and mine must work at different levels.. IF you live in New York and want to travel to Delhi for example there is no passenger plane in the world that can take you there non stop. You have to at the very least land somewhere over Europe and refuel or change planes.
Now if the airline you happen to be booking your flight with is named British Airways or Virgin Atlantic for example then that passenger has already contributed hundreds of pounds to the British economy regardless of if they ever set foot out of the airport simply by buying their ticket from a British based company which pays taxes, which in turn employs people in the UK, who go on to pay taxes.
British airways has 40% of the flights from Heathrow. Add virgin to that and other British based airlines and probably at least 50% of the airlines flying into and out of Heathrow are British.
Take away the transit passengers and a £600 flight goes up to £800 to cover the loss made by the airline.
And why doesn't the government get off their butts and do something to attract more transit passengers to come out of the Airport and visit London, spend some more money and then catch their flight later or the next day?
I met with someone a few weeks ago who had a 10 hour stop over in Heathrow and came out, went into London, had a meal and returned to the airport in time for her next flight.
If you've ever flown to Hong Kong Airport you'll know that you can check in your luggage upto 24 hours inadvance of your flight for free at two different train stations, which suddenly free's you up to explore the city, do more shopping and spend more money.
As far as my maths goes your so called commonsense thinking that a person who never leaves the airport hasn't contributed much is rubbish UNLESS there's some special clause which means they get to fly to Heathrow on a British Airline for free .. if they've booked their flight with a UK based airline they've contributed hundreds of pounds to the UK.
There are 24 million transfer passengers going through Heathrow - if 50% booked with a British Airline then thats 12 million times a fare of say £500 on average (to keep the maths easy) comes to around £6 Billion a year in income to British companies plus about another £2 Billion a year they've saved other passengers by filling up seats that might otherwise be empty. What is more that contribution is made as soon as they pay for their airline tickets which in some cases can be many months in advance of taking the flight. I've bought tickets to go to Australia 9 months in advance of the flight - that money left my bank account and wired it's way over to Qantas and contributed to the Australian economy and I've not even stepped foot on the plane, let alone out of the airport in Sydney.... do you still think people who don't leave the airport don't make a huge contribution to the economy of the country ?
Saying you have commonsense and being able to actually demonstrate it are two different things ...
If you think figures like £8 Billion a year is a small contribution to the UK then your idea of small and mine differ greatly.
Bearing in mind BA's total turnover for the last year was around £8bn I think its fair to say you've gone way OTT on your figures for Heathrow,and that's before you consider the fact that £2bn of the overall turnover goes straight to a Non-UK fuel provider. Besides, there is nothing at all forcing BA to use Heathrow, they are a global company, they can quite easily use any other International airport in the world for transfers to reduce the number of flights into and out of the UK. Interestingly while looking for figures I found a quote from former BA boss Bob Ayling who agreed with me in that transit passengers overall contribute little to the economy.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/transport/article3926496.ece also backs it up.
Besides, my primary point remains, which is that we should be cutting down on domestic flights and encouraging greener forms of Public Transport for domestic and local European flights and hence Heathrow shouldn't be expanded.
But it's an affront to the democratic principles of this country.
Labour have pretty much lost themselves the general election, good going. Now we get tories who are going to fuck us over that much more.
How so? This is how our democracy works, unlike the Swiss we dont vote on every policy change.
BAA lied when they assured us that if Terminal 5 was approved they would never ask for a 3rd runway as it would not be needed. Shortly after T5 was given the go ahead, they went and said Heathrow was at full capacity and the runway and a sixth terminal for good measure were needed.
They're lying cunts and all their claims should be dismissed as the bollocks they are. The whole figures of 'billions lost' are nothing but a load of scaremongering bullshit. Nor that everything should come down to money, anyway. We need to cut down on CO2 emissions, pollution and noise, not double it.
I'm delighted to say that this has hit Labour very badly in the polls. There's a poll in the Sunday Times tomorrow which gives the Tories a 13-point lead over Labour. Naturally, nothing makes me happier than knowing Gordon Brown is going to have a crap weekend thanks to this. I just feel sorry for whichever telephone that he'll end up throwing at someone when he has a tantrum. Gordon Brown - the Prime Minister who never won an election. Mind you, after the 10p tax debacle, I hope they're in opposition for another 18 years.
The Tories have vowed to scrap this project, and industry insiders believe that it will never go ahead. Not for the first time, Labour has shot itself in the foot.
Heathrow is a shit hole anything to make it better.
Contempt for democracy? No, I was just pointing out how our form of democracy normally works. Personally I think our form of it is quite rubbish but this decision without a vote isnt that out of the ordinary.
You are too young to know what you are wishing for in terms of the Tories, crime and social division are almost certain to rise if they get into power.
It's a significant change. It should be voted on. As one MP put it, the "most significant public infrastructure project in a generation". If they can vote to ban fox hunting, they can vote to dramatically increase the size of the country's premier airport.
As I implied, my bigger concern is handing the country over to the tories. Can't we have lib dems please? Because we do need a change, if not for the better at least not as bad as the tories.
By the way, whilst on the topic of the 1980s, I wonder what you make of champagne socialist and complete and utter cunt Derek Hatton's remarks last week that Margaret Thatcher should have been aborted. I'm surprised how Aladdin, normally the first to aim venom towards this woman at any opportunity, didn't make a whole thread about it, actually...
Well it'd be similar to the last 12 years then......
Unfortunately, these days, so are labour.
Most of us have to work to make a living, so that's a bad thing. Those few who are more worried about having their huge stockpiles of gold eroded by taxation should be quite happy about it.
Have a quick read of the pros and cons of the tories:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_condensation
I've not heard anyone suggest that this recession is because of the Tories, and I wouldnt either. There are a mix of factors, the main one being that this seems to be the pattern that the Western World has been in for a long time, a period of boom followed by a period of bust.
There is the lack of regulation in the financial market, this was certainly the governments fault, although if we had had tight regulations and the rest of the world didnt we would have massively lost out in terms of growth.
Personally I'd rather not have either Labour or the Tories, but out of the two the former is the better option in my opinion.
As for comments about Thatchers mother, what is there to say, they are unpleasant and uncalled for. More than anything I'm surprised that people can still get worked up about her, she's a dottery old woman.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7864546.stm
One incident and the entire airport grinds to a halt. At least a new runway could be designed with the latest developments like being heated to help melt away snow.