Heathrow Airport, originally called London Airport until 1966 and now known as London Heathrow, is a major international airport in London, England. With Gatwick, City, Luton, Stansted and Southend, it is one of six international airports serving London. The airport facility is owned and operated by Heathrow Airport Holdings. In 2020, it was the third busiest airport in the world by international passenger traffic, the twenty-second busiest airport in the world by total passenger traffic, and the third busiest airport in Europe by passenger traffic.
London Stansted Airport is an international airport located in Stansted Mountfitchet, Essex, England, 42 mi (68 km) northeast of Central London.
Gatwick Airport, also known as London Gatwick, is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, 29.5 miles (47.5 km) south of Central London. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Gatwick was the second-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after Heathrow Airport, and was the tenth-busiest airport in Europe. It covers a total area of 674 hectares.
Thames Gateway is a term applied to an area around the Thames Estuary in the context of discourse around regeneration and further urbanisation. The term was first coined by the UK government and applies to an area of land stretching 70 kilometres (43 mi) east from inner east and south-east London on both sides of the River Thames and the Thames Estuary. It stretches from Westferry in Tower Hamlets to the Isle of Sheppey/Southend-on-Sea and extends across three ceremonial counties.
Heathrow Airtrack was a proposed railway link in the United Kingdom which would link Heathrow Airport in west London to London Waterloo railway station in Central London.
The environmental effects of aviation in the United Kingdom are increasing due to the increasing demand for air travel in the country. In the past 25 years the UK air transport industry has seen sustained growth, and the demand for passenger air travel in particular is forecast to increase more than twofold, to 465 million passengers, by 2030. Two airports; London Heathrow and London Gatwick, are amongst the top ten busiest airports in the world for international passenger traffic. Whilst more than half of all passengers travelling by air in the UK currently travel via the five London area airports, regional airports have experienced the most growth in recent years, due to the success of 'no-frills' airlines over the last decade.
Heathrow Hub railway station was a proposed interchange that would serve – mainly – a now disbanded potential alignment of High Speed 2 (HS2) services that would adjoin the expanded part of Heathrow Airport, England. It was a cornerstone part of an expansion plan put forward in 2008, by engineering firm Arup, to set up the UK's first high-speed rail network north-west of London.
The expansion of Heathrow Airport is a series of proposals to add to the runways at London's busiest airport beyond its two long runways which are intensively used to serve four terminals and a large cargo operation. The plans are those presented by Heathrow Airport Holdings and an independent proposal by Heathrow Hub with the main object of increasing capacity.
A potential Thames Estuary Airport has been proposed at various times since the 1940s. London's existing principal airports, Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted, are each sub-optimally located in various ways, such as being too close to built-up areas or requiring aircraft to fly low over London. In the case of Heathrow, the growth of air traffic has meant that the airport is operating at 98% capacity. Several locations for a new airport have been proposed in the Thames Estuary, to the east of London. These include Maplin Sands off Foulness on the north side of the estuary; Cliffe and the Isle of Grain in Kent on the south side; and artificial islands located off the Isle of Sheppey such as the "Boris Island" proposal championed by Boris Johnson, the then Mayor of London. Economic considerations have so far ruled out a new coastal airport, while political considerations have ruled out a new inland airport, leaving planners with an as-yet-unresolved dilemma.
In its early years what is now Heathrow Airport was the Great West Aerodrome, sometimes known as Heathrow Aerodrome.
Heathwick is an informal name for a 2011 proposal to create a high-speed rail link between London's Heathrow and Gatwick airports, in effect to combine them into a single airport. Proponents argue this would balance their capacity and so reduce the need to add more runways to Heathrow, or more airports in the south-east of England. In 2018 the similar project HS4Air was proposed.
The Thames Hub is a proposal for a new approach to integrated infrastructure development that combines rail, intermodal freight logistics, aviation, tidal renewable energy and its transmission, flood protection and regional development in the Thames Estuary and connects this infrastructure to a trade and utilities spine that runs the length of the UK. It was developed by architects Foster + Partners, infrastructure consultants Halcrow and economists Volterra and launched by Lord Foster at the Institution of Civil Engineers in London on 2 November 2011.
The metropolitan area of London, England, United Kingdom is served by six international airports and several smaller airports. Together, they make the busiest airport system in the world by passenger numbers and the second-busiest by aircraft movements. In 2018, the six airports handled a total of 177,054,819 passengers. The London airports handle over 60% of all the UK's air traffic. The airports serve a total of 14 domestic destinations and 396 international destinations.
The Airports Commission was an independent commission established in September 2012 by the Government of the United Kingdom to consider how the UK can "maintain its status as an international hub for aviation and immediate actions to improve the use of existing runway capacity in the next 5 years". Alongside the proposal to build HS2, the question of how to make best use of and expand airport capacity has become the UK's most significant infrastructure issue over the last few years.
Thames Hub Airport was a proposed platform-based hub airport located on the Isle of Grain in the Thames Estuary in Kent, whose development has been led by the architect Lord Foster. The idea for the airport was originally included within the Thames Hub integrated infrastructure vision, and the idea of some kind of airport in the Thames Estuary has been discussed since the 1970s.
The Western Rail Approach to Heathrow is a proposed bi-directional link westward from London's Heathrow Airport to the Great Western Main Line. It would thus run, in council areas, from Greater London under Iver, South Bucks, Buckinghamshire to Langley, Slough. Beginning at Heathrow Terminal 5 station, it would run via a tunnel to a junction east of Langley station, therefore allowing trains to run to and from destinations in the west: Slough, Reading and beyond. When completed, it would improve rail connections to Heathrow from the Thames Valley as well as from South West England, South Wales and The Midlands. It would also reduce congestion at London Paddington station by removing the need, which presently exists, for Heathrow passengers bound to those regions, to travel to Hayes and Harlington and then change at Reading or to make their interchange at Paddington, central London. Paddington would remain an interchange for services to/from Euston, Saint Pancras and London generally and a little of the Great Western Main Line would gain rail capacity as many services would take the resultant side loop via Heathrow.
The expansion of Gatwick Airport has involved several proposals aimed at increasing airport capacity in south east England and relieving congestion at the main hub airport Heathrow.
Daniel Michael Gerald Moylan, Baron Moylan Hon. FRIBA is an English Conservative politician, a member of the House of Lords, holding dual British and Irish citizenship.
