Jonathan
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First off, apologies for the length of this post. 
I've recycled this from a topic that I posted on that other site after seeing an article in The Independent recently. The original has been edited slightly to account for typing errors, and I shall also add some discussion on the article I spotted. During the morning of Wednesday 18th January 2012, I went on Twitter to find that 'Boris Island' was trending. You may be asking what on earth Boris Island is. Well, put simply, Boris Johnson - Mayor of London and one of very few half-decent Tories - thinks that in order to ensure that the UK remains a global aviation hub, a new airport should be built on an artificial island in the Thames Estuary to the east of London to supplement - or even replace - Heathrow Airport. Hence the nickname 'Boris Island' for the project. Now, normally, I'd use Wikipedia for research, but seeing as that's offline today, I'm having to use other means. This note will look at the reasons for and against Boris Island, as well as a bit of background information about the London airports.
Right, to start off, we need to consider the history of airports in London. There are currently six airports that have London in their names:
Heathrow and City are the only two airports within Greater London itself, but the other airports (with the possible exception of Southend) are relatively easy to get to from London itself. As we all know, Heathrow Airport, in the west of the capital, is the UK's busiest airport, as well as the world's busiest in terms of international passengers carried. When it was created, it originally had six runways arranged in a star pattern, but now, there are two parallel runways to the north and south of Terminals 1 & 3 (Terminal 2 is undergoing a complete rebuild), with Terminal 4 to the south of the southern runway and Terminal 5 to the west of the airport complex. There were plans to build a third runway to the north of the airport and also a sixth terminal, but these plans were shelved when the Coalition came into power in May 2010. Heathrow has four terminals in use, with 89 airlines serving 176 destinations in 90 countries, and British Airways having exclusive use of Terminal 5, although some BA flights still operate from other terminals, as (presumably) Terminal 5's satellite buildings are not yet fully completed. Gatwick is the second-busiest of the London airports, located near Crawley in Surrey, to the south of the capital, with two terminals (North and South), and one runway. It's often called 'the busiest single-runway airport in the world'. Gatwick has 60 airlines serving over 200 destinations in 90 countries, and there are no plans to expand it until 2019 at the very earliest. London's third busiest airport is Stansted in Essex to the north-east of Bishop's Stortford, with 13 airlines serving over 150 destinations in 31 countries. A second runway was planned for Stansted, but was scrapped, and is now unlikely to be completed. Luton Airport is located near Luton (obviously), and has 13 airlines serving 90 destinations in multiple countries. London City Airport is an interesting airport, as it is a single-runway airport near the City of London itself, serving over 30 destinations across the UK, Europe and the USA. Aircraft have to be given special permission to land here, as the approach is steeper than normal airports, and if aircraft are landing from the west or taking off from the east, then they have to taxi on the runway itself. London City Airport is very popular with business travellers due to its location being near the City and only a few miles east of the centre of London, and is famous for having a much less stressful airport environment as a whole. Southend Airport is the most recent addition to the 'London' airports, being renamed in order to boost its profile, and with easyJet starting flights there, its profile is sure to increase.
Now we know about the six London airports (there is also London Oxford Airport, but many people, including myself, don't count it as one), issues surrounding expansion of the current airports need to be considered. Heathrow's sixth terminal and third runway were scrapped by the Coalition for numerous reasons, one of them possibly being that the entire village of Sipson would have had to be demolished. Because Wikipedia's down, and I can't be bothered to research, I'm not going to go into the other airports, but there is one clear issue - pollution, be it by jet fuel or by by aircraft noise. I can understand the aircraft noise issue, as it can be very annoying to have planes thundering over your head every couple of minutes for the majority of the day. I even live under the flight path to Newquay Airport when I'm not at uni, but I don't really mind it all that much. However, what really irks me is when people move near an airport in full knowledge that there is an airport nearby and then moan. I can't put into words what I think about people like that, as it would be unprintable. Pollution from jet fuel is, understandably, another issue, but cleaner aircraft like the Boeing 787 are being built to help to address this issue.
So, what are the possible benefits of Boris Island? Well, I am shamelessly nicking them from the Wikipedia article - which I have managed to access - located here. I shall state each point, and try to expand on it. (I'll do the same for the drawbacks as well.)
1. Flights would no longer arrive or depart over densly populated areas of London.
Heathrow, as we all know, doesn't have much room to expand, and it's surrounded by thousands of houses, causing grievances for so many people in West London. Boris Island would help to address this somewhat.
2. Noise and air pollution would be much less of a nuisance, because the new airport would be in an unpopulated area.
This links in with the previous benefit, but the fact remains that noise and air pollution would still exist, although they wouldn't be as obvious to the general public.
3. Offshore island and new barrier will help to control floodplain.
The Thames Barrier is alleged to not be as good as had originally been planned, and a second barrier has been mooted to try and control this somewhat, possibly coming with Boris Island.
4. As many runways and terminals as necessary could be constructed, without destroying existing settlements, whereas Heathrow is hemmed in by residents.
The plans for Boris Island are for a four-runway airport, with two pairs of two parallel runways, in a similar set-up to Heathrow, and multiple terminals. If Boris Island were to be built, then expansion would theoretically be easier.
5. Flights could arrive and depart at all hours.
Heathrow currently has night restrictions in place, meaning that certain aircraft can neither take off nor land. Because Boris Island would be farther away from settlements, flights would be able to land and take off at night, increasing money coming into the economy, although anyone who would take a flight that takes off or lands at 3 in the morning is, in my opinion, rather silly.
6. 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.
The high speed rail link would probably come off High Speed 1. 20 minutes from Boris Island to London would be a vast improvement on most services to airports, but it takes 15 minutes to get from London Paddington to Heathrow Airport on the Heathrow Express service. I'm probably being slightly picky here, mind.
7. 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.
This can be linked to benefit 6, and I think that it's relatively self-explanatory.
8. Crossrail could be extended easily to connect new airport.
Crossrail is a massive project going from Maidenhead and Heathrow Airport (it will take over Heathrow Connect when Crossrail is completed at the end of the decade) in the west to Abbey Wood and Shenfield in the east. It's aimed at making cross-capital travel easier, and there wouldn't be too much of an issue in extending it to Boris Island. It's also allegedly planned to extend it from Maidenhead to Reading in the future, in conjunction with the electrification of the Great Western Main Line to Reading and beyond, opening it up to even more people.
9. 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.
There are other proposals for airports in the Thames Estuary, but I feel that this point is still relevant for Boris Island. Having an airport in the Thames Estuary would mean that access could be achieved from two counties, thereby reducing problems, although new transport infrastructure would have to be built at a great cost, including tunnels under the Thames Estuary.
10. Regeneration of the deprived Thames Gateway.
Unfortunately, I don't know much about this, but from what I've gathered, the Thames Gateway has been designated a priority regeneration area.
11. Release of 2,500 acres (10 sqkm) of prime land at Heathrow, close to the M4 and with excellent rail links, highly suitable for housing redevelopment.
Heathrow is a massive site, and if the airport were to close, thousands of houses could be built on it, as well as commercial buildings, schools, leisure facilities, and more.
12. Traffic in west London would be greatly eased.
Without traffic to and from Heathrow, congestion wouldn't be as much of an issue, although with possibly thousands of new homes being built, there could well be some congestion as well.
13. Flexible approach for future expansion i.e. new runaway or Virgin Galactic type development.
I've dealt with expansion flexibility earlier on, but Virgin Galactic is an interesting one. Basically, it's a programme to sell commercial flights to send people into space.
14. Possible direct connection with Central London using high speed catamarans as a new state-of-the-art tourist attraction.
Ooh, now this is an interesting one. High speed catamarans from somewhere on the banks of the Thames could prove to be a massive money spinner for the local economy, and with various methods of getting to Boris Island, it could prove to be an attractive airport to use, thereby securing the UK's status as a global aviation hub.
Right, now for the drawbacks.
1. 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.
With any major construction project, the infrastructure necessary to serve it is of vital importance as well. Billions of pounds would need to be spent on infrastructure to support Boris Island.
2. 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 in 1974, Munich in 1992, Denver in 1995, Oslo in 1998, Hong Kong in 1998, Kuala Lumpur in 1998, Athens in 2001, and Bangkok in 2006.
It would be a complete logistical nightmare to switch flights from one airport to another. To ensure a smooth transition, it would probably have to be done over a period of a few years. But the other cities have successfully changed their main airports, so it is possible for London to be able to do the same. Furthermore, Berlin's three airports (Tegel, Tempelhof (closed since 2008) and Schönfeld) are due to be merging into the new Berlin Brandenburg Airport (itself an expansion of Schönfeld) within the next 12 months after numerous delays, so there is also the potential of adding the traffic from another London airport into Boris Island as well, although this could be rather unlikely.
3. There would be significant job losses at Heathrow, and knock-on impacts to the economy of west London.
In times of austerity, any job losses are magnified, and for thousands of jobs to be lost at Heathrow would be a disaster, although those jobs may be transferred to Boris Island. The economy would suffer in west London, but with possibly massive construction projects for the Heathrow site, this could be offset somewhat.
4. 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.
The Wikipedia article looks at the Cliffe proposal in more detail. But a cost of at least £15bn for an airport is a lot of money, which is hard to come by in circumstances such as these. Is £15bn a price worth paying?
5. 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.
Transport connections would run into the billions, thereby pushing the cost up even further towards £20bn.
6. Proposals rely on using capacity on High Speed 1, which may be scarce.
High Speed 1 has only started being used for non-Eurostar services in the past few years, but it seems to be the case that it's being used more and more, and a high-speed link from the Continent to Boris Island could prove very beneficial.
7. Building an artificial offshore island is time-consuming, adding 3 to 5 years to the construction time.
I'm no expert on construction, but I'd estimate that including the artificial island, it could take 10 years to construct Boris Island Airport, which is a VERY long time!
8. The risk of bird strike is higher for coastal sites, although less so for off-shore sites.
I think this one kinda speaks for itself.
9. The level of demand for an airport in the Thames estuary is uncertain, and may require government intervention to force airlines to use it.
I don't know of anybody who thinks that Boris Island is necessary. And if the Government has to get involved to make airlines use Boris Island, then things are likely to get very messy.
10. Building a major new airport to expand capacity may encourage more flights, and thereby increase emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases.
Pretty self-explanatory, this one.
11. The presence of the wreck of the SS Richard Montgomery, which has around 1,400 tons of explosives on board. A way to remove the wreck safely, present since 1944, has not yet been found.
A wrecked ship with a high amount of explosives on board is a massive safety risk, and could blow the whole Boris Island project out of the water. (Pun intended.)
12. 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 would cause knock on effects in other countries.
I'm not qualified to make comment on this issue.
13. The South East of England (SE) is already highly developed, with a population density reported (in 2011) as the the 3rd (or 6th, depending on the criteria used) most dense in the World. Many areas of the SE already have 3 or 4 layers of audible Air Traffic over them.
Again, I can't really comment on this.
One drawback that I think is one of vital importance is that by moving London's main airport to the east, it would increase travel times for the vast majority of the country, only really benefitting Kent, Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk.
So, should Boris Island be built? There are clear benefits and drawbacks to the proposal, but I don't think that it should be built. The set-up cost would be too great, it would be a logistical nightmare, the economic effects on west London could be drastic, and it would only benefit a minority of people in the country. There are, of course, alternatives. What I'm interested in, though, are your thoughts on Boris Island. Do you think it should be built? If so, why? If not, why not? And do you think that alternatives should be considered?
Now for the article from The Independent, which can be found here. This might take a bit of explaining, so bear with me. Heathrow has two parallel runways (09R/27L and 09L/27R for you airport geeks), and they currently operate on a system whereby one runway is used for take-offs and the other for landings, switching over at 3pm each day to alleviate the residents. The proposal is to change this to 'mixed-mode', with runways being used for both take-offs and landings at the same time (not literally, mind! ). This, according to the article, would allow a maximum of 108 movements per hour compared to the current 87 (one movement being counted as either one take-off or one landing, so a plane that lands and then takes off again is counted as two aircraft movements) - an increase of 24.1%, and annual passenger numbers could increase from the current 70m to 87m given typical current aircraft usage - an increase of 24.2%. It would cause more problems for residents, who would have to suffer the noise of one plane every 90 seconds or so according to the article. Furthermore, airports which have lost links to Heathrow (Inverness, Leeds/Bradford and Newquay) could have links re-established thanks to the theoretical increase in capacity. I'd certainly welcome a link from Newquay to Heathrow. My house to London in about two hours? Yes, please!
Your thoughts on all of this, please.
EDIT: There's also this article, which provides for some interesting reading as well.
I've recycled this from a topic that I posted on that other site after seeing an article in The Independent recently. The original has been edited slightly to account for typing errors, and I shall also add some discussion on the article I spotted. During the morning of Wednesday 18th January 2012, I went on Twitter to find that 'Boris Island' was trending. You may be asking what on earth Boris Island is. Well, put simply, Boris Johnson - Mayor of London and one of very few half-decent Tories - thinks that in order to ensure that the UK remains a global aviation hub, a new airport should be built on an artificial island in the Thames Estuary to the east of London to supplement - or even replace - Heathrow Airport. Hence the nickname 'Boris Island' for the project. Now, normally, I'd use Wikipedia for research, but seeing as that's offline today, I'm having to use other means. This note will look at the reasons for and against Boris Island, as well as a bit of background information about the London airports.
Right, to start off, we need to consider the history of airports in London. There are currently six airports that have London in their names:
- London Heathrow Airport
- London Gatwick Airport
- London Stansted Airport
- London Luton Airport
- London City Airport
- London Southend Airport
Heathrow and City are the only two airports within Greater London itself, but the other airports (with the possible exception of Southend) are relatively easy to get to from London itself. As we all know, Heathrow Airport, in the west of the capital, is the UK's busiest airport, as well as the world's busiest in terms of international passengers carried. When it was created, it originally had six runways arranged in a star pattern, but now, there are two parallel runways to the north and south of Terminals 1 & 3 (Terminal 2 is undergoing a complete rebuild), with Terminal 4 to the south of the southern runway and Terminal 5 to the west of the airport complex. There were plans to build a third runway to the north of the airport and also a sixth terminal, but these plans were shelved when the Coalition came into power in May 2010. Heathrow has four terminals in use, with 89 airlines serving 176 destinations in 90 countries, and British Airways having exclusive use of Terminal 5, although some BA flights still operate from other terminals, as (presumably) Terminal 5's satellite buildings are not yet fully completed. Gatwick is the second-busiest of the London airports, located near Crawley in Surrey, to the south of the capital, with two terminals (North and South), and one runway. It's often called 'the busiest single-runway airport in the world'. Gatwick has 60 airlines serving over 200 destinations in 90 countries, and there are no plans to expand it until 2019 at the very earliest. London's third busiest airport is Stansted in Essex to the north-east of Bishop's Stortford, with 13 airlines serving over 150 destinations in 31 countries. A second runway was planned for Stansted, but was scrapped, and is now unlikely to be completed. Luton Airport is located near Luton (obviously), and has 13 airlines serving 90 destinations in multiple countries. London City Airport is an interesting airport, as it is a single-runway airport near the City of London itself, serving over 30 destinations across the UK, Europe and the USA. Aircraft have to be given special permission to land here, as the approach is steeper than normal airports, and if aircraft are landing from the west or taking off from the east, then they have to taxi on the runway itself. London City Airport is very popular with business travellers due to its location being near the City and only a few miles east of the centre of London, and is famous for having a much less stressful airport environment as a whole. Southend Airport is the most recent addition to the 'London' airports, being renamed in order to boost its profile, and with easyJet starting flights there, its profile is sure to increase.
Now we know about the six London airports (there is also London Oxford Airport, but many people, including myself, don't count it as one), issues surrounding expansion of the current airports need to be considered. Heathrow's sixth terminal and third runway were scrapped by the Coalition for numerous reasons, one of them possibly being that the entire village of Sipson would have had to be demolished. Because Wikipedia's down, and I can't be bothered to research, I'm not going to go into the other airports, but there is one clear issue - pollution, be it by jet fuel or by by aircraft noise. I can understand the aircraft noise issue, as it can be very annoying to have planes thundering over your head every couple of minutes for the majority of the day. I even live under the flight path to Newquay Airport when I'm not at uni, but I don't really mind it all that much. However, what really irks me is when people move near an airport in full knowledge that there is an airport nearby and then moan. I can't put into words what I think about people like that, as it would be unprintable. Pollution from jet fuel is, understandably, another issue, but cleaner aircraft like the Boeing 787 are being built to help to address this issue.
So, what are the possible benefits of Boris Island? Well, I am shamelessly nicking them from the Wikipedia article - which I have managed to access - located here. I shall state each point, and try to expand on it. (I'll do the same for the drawbacks as well.)
1. Flights would no longer arrive or depart over densly populated areas of London.
Heathrow, as we all know, doesn't have much room to expand, and it's surrounded by thousands of houses, causing grievances for so many people in West London. Boris Island would help to address this somewhat.
2. Noise and air pollution would be much less of a nuisance, because the new airport would be in an unpopulated area.
This links in with the previous benefit, but the fact remains that noise and air pollution would still exist, although they wouldn't be as obvious to the general public.
3. Offshore island and new barrier will help to control floodplain.
The Thames Barrier is alleged to not be as good as had originally been planned, and a second barrier has been mooted to try and control this somewhat, possibly coming with Boris Island.
4. As many runways and terminals as necessary could be constructed, without destroying existing settlements, whereas Heathrow is hemmed in by residents.
The plans for Boris Island are for a four-runway airport, with two pairs of two parallel runways, in a similar set-up to Heathrow, and multiple terminals. If Boris Island were to be built, then expansion would theoretically be easier.
5. Flights could arrive and depart at all hours.
Heathrow currently has night restrictions in place, meaning that certain aircraft can neither take off nor land. Because Boris Island would be farther away from settlements, flights would be able to land and take off at night, increasing money coming into the economy, although anyone who would take a flight that takes off or lands at 3 in the morning is, in my opinion, rather silly.
6. 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.
The high speed rail link would probably come off High Speed 1. 20 minutes from Boris Island to London would be a vast improvement on most services to airports, but it takes 15 minutes to get from London Paddington to Heathrow Airport on the Heathrow Express service. I'm probably being slightly picky here, mind.
7. 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.
This can be linked to benefit 6, and I think that it's relatively self-explanatory.
8. Crossrail could be extended easily to connect new airport.
Crossrail is a massive project going from Maidenhead and Heathrow Airport (it will take over Heathrow Connect when Crossrail is completed at the end of the decade) in the west to Abbey Wood and Shenfield in the east. It's aimed at making cross-capital travel easier, and there wouldn't be too much of an issue in extending it to Boris Island. It's also allegedly planned to extend it from Maidenhead to Reading in the future, in conjunction with the electrification of the Great Western Main Line to Reading and beyond, opening it up to even more people.
9. 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.
There are other proposals for airports in the Thames Estuary, but I feel that this point is still relevant for Boris Island. Having an airport in the Thames Estuary would mean that access could be achieved from two counties, thereby reducing problems, although new transport infrastructure would have to be built at a great cost, including tunnels under the Thames Estuary.
10. Regeneration of the deprived Thames Gateway.
Unfortunately, I don't know much about this, but from what I've gathered, the Thames Gateway has been designated a priority regeneration area.
11. Release of 2,500 acres (10 sqkm) of prime land at Heathrow, close to the M4 and with excellent rail links, highly suitable for housing redevelopment.
Heathrow is a massive site, and if the airport were to close, thousands of houses could be built on it, as well as commercial buildings, schools, leisure facilities, and more.
12. Traffic in west London would be greatly eased.
Without traffic to and from Heathrow, congestion wouldn't be as much of an issue, although with possibly thousands of new homes being built, there could well be some congestion as well.
13. Flexible approach for future expansion i.e. new runaway or Virgin Galactic type development.
I've dealt with expansion flexibility earlier on, but Virgin Galactic is an interesting one. Basically, it's a programme to sell commercial flights to send people into space.
14. Possible direct connection with Central London using high speed catamarans as a new state-of-the-art tourist attraction.
Ooh, now this is an interesting one. High speed catamarans from somewhere on the banks of the Thames could prove to be a massive money spinner for the local economy, and with various methods of getting to Boris Island, it could prove to be an attractive airport to use, thereby securing the UK's status as a global aviation hub.
Right, now for the drawbacks.
1. 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.
With any major construction project, the infrastructure necessary to serve it is of vital importance as well. Billions of pounds would need to be spent on infrastructure to support Boris Island.
2. 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 in 1974, Munich in 1992, Denver in 1995, Oslo in 1998, Hong Kong in 1998, Kuala Lumpur in 1998, Athens in 2001, and Bangkok in 2006.
It would be a complete logistical nightmare to switch flights from one airport to another. To ensure a smooth transition, it would probably have to be done over a period of a few years. But the other cities have successfully changed their main airports, so it is possible for London to be able to do the same. Furthermore, Berlin's three airports (Tegel, Tempelhof (closed since 2008) and Schönfeld) are due to be merging into the new Berlin Brandenburg Airport (itself an expansion of Schönfeld) within the next 12 months after numerous delays, so there is also the potential of adding the traffic from another London airport into Boris Island as well, although this could be rather unlikely.
3. There would be significant job losses at Heathrow, and knock-on impacts to the economy of west London.
In times of austerity, any job losses are magnified, and for thousands of jobs to be lost at Heathrow would be a disaster, although those jobs may be transferred to Boris Island. The economy would suffer in west London, but with possibly massive construction projects for the Heathrow site, this could be offset somewhat.
4. 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.
The Wikipedia article looks at the Cliffe proposal in more detail. But a cost of at least £15bn for an airport is a lot of money, which is hard to come by in circumstances such as these. Is £15bn a price worth paying?
5. 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.
Transport connections would run into the billions, thereby pushing the cost up even further towards £20bn.
6. Proposals rely on using capacity on High Speed 1, which may be scarce.
High Speed 1 has only started being used for non-Eurostar services in the past few years, but it seems to be the case that it's being used more and more, and a high-speed link from the Continent to Boris Island could prove very beneficial.
7. Building an artificial offshore island is time-consuming, adding 3 to 5 years to the construction time.
I'm no expert on construction, but I'd estimate that including the artificial island, it could take 10 years to construct Boris Island Airport, which is a VERY long time!
8. The risk of bird strike is higher for coastal sites, although less so for off-shore sites.
I think this one kinda speaks for itself.
9. The level of demand for an airport in the Thames estuary is uncertain, and may require government intervention to force airlines to use it.
I don't know of anybody who thinks that Boris Island is necessary. And if the Government has to get involved to make airlines use Boris Island, then things are likely to get very messy.
10. Building a major new airport to expand capacity may encourage more flights, and thereby increase emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases.
Pretty self-explanatory, this one.
11. The presence of the wreck of the SS Richard Montgomery, which has around 1,400 tons of explosives on board. A way to remove the wreck safely, present since 1944, has not yet been found.
A wrecked ship with a high amount of explosives on board is a massive safety risk, and could blow the whole Boris Island project out of the water. (Pun intended.)
12. 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 would cause knock on effects in other countries.
I'm not qualified to make comment on this issue.
13. The South East of England (SE) is already highly developed, with a population density reported (in 2011) as the the 3rd (or 6th, depending on the criteria used) most dense in the World. Many areas of the SE already have 3 or 4 layers of audible Air Traffic over them.
Again, I can't really comment on this.
One drawback that I think is one of vital importance is that by moving London's main airport to the east, it would increase travel times for the vast majority of the country, only really benefitting Kent, Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk.
So, should Boris Island be built? There are clear benefits and drawbacks to the proposal, but I don't think that it should be built. The set-up cost would be too great, it would be a logistical nightmare, the economic effects on west London could be drastic, and it would only benefit a minority of people in the country. There are, of course, alternatives. What I'm interested in, though, are your thoughts on Boris Island. Do you think it should be built? If so, why? If not, why not? And do you think that alternatives should be considered?
Now for the article from The Independent, which can be found here. This might take a bit of explaining, so bear with me. Heathrow has two parallel runways (09R/27L and 09L/27R for you airport geeks
), and they currently operate on a system whereby one runway is used for take-offs and the other for landings, switching over at 3pm each day to alleviate the residents. The proposal is to change this to 'mixed-mode', with runways being used for both take-offs and landings at the same time (not literally, mind! ). This, according to the article, would allow a maximum of 108 movements per hour compared to the current 87 (one movement being counted as either one take-off or one landing, so a plane that lands and then takes off again is counted as two aircraft movements) - an increase of 24.1%, and annual passenger numbers could increase from the current 70m to 87m given typical current aircraft usage - an increase of 24.2%. It would cause more problems for residents, who would have to suffer the noise of one plane every 90 seconds or so according to the article. Furthermore, airports which have lost links to Heathrow (Inverness, Leeds/Bradford and Newquay) could have links re-established thanks to the theoretical increase in capacity. I'd certainly welcome a link from Newquay to Heathrow. My house to London in about two hours? Yes, please! Your thoughts on all of this, please.
EDIT: There's also this article, which provides for some interesting reading as well.
