This comment is completely pointless in the sense that it will make no difference at all to what happens in the future. Although the situation we are addressing affects the lives millions of people in the UK and vast numbers in the rest of the world's commercial air transport system, and although many people everywhere will read this, it will be about as effective as complaining about the weather.
The UK government is about to make a critical decision on the future of London Heathrow airport, the world's busiest intercontinental hub. The decision has to solve the drastic shortage of runway capacity in the UK's south east, where no new runway has been built since the Second World War. Meanwhile, the anticipated decision - to build a third runway at Heathrow in addition to the second already approved for Stansted - is facing a tsunami of late-gathering opposition which could kill it, leaving the government bereft of solutions that could be implemented before the UK's economy takes a serious hit through lack of global connectivity.
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© Flight International/Tim Bicheno-Brown |
The problem is that the government has no choice but to make a decision, but whichever one it makes will be bad. The time for optimum solutions passed during the 1970s, but governments don't do strategy.
Source: Flight International