http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7829676.stm
Prepare for years of protests, arguments and delays...
Prepare for years of protests, arguments and delays...
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Third Runway at Heathrow gets Go Ahead
- Thread starter robbieduncan
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Personally I'm somewhat undecided. Perhaps we need the runway. Perhaps not. Maybe expanding Gatwick would be better. Maybe scrapping Heathrow entirely and building a new, modern airport in Thames Estuary would be better (although as Heathrow already exists the environment cost of this would appear to be huge).
Maybe we should build high-speed rail links instead...
The options are numerous. They have all been weighed up and this is the one chosen...
Not surprising in the slightest. What big business wants, big business gets.
And the people that live where this thing is going to go? Well, they can just be forcibly moved can't they?
And the people that live where this thing is going to go? Well, they can just be forcibly moved can't they?
My preferred option. Anyone who uses the Eurostar would probably agree.
In some ways mine too, at least for travel within the UK and near-European destinations, but the cost of building and then running them is huge. The TGV network in France only survives due to huge government subsidy...
could you imagine it though? our rail networks are pretty crap and the prices we pay are crazy (most times)...
if somehow high speed rail was achieved.. who could afford to use it?
That is largely the problem isn't it. If I want to go to Aberdeen from London it's often cheaper to fly than take the train. And it only takes a couple of hours to fly...
It takes longer once you factor in extended journey times to and from airports, check in time etc. With rail you turn up and go.
In this country? ROFL.
I remember when the German's were developing trains for us, they actually had to spend £3m smashing and battering a piece of their track to get it like ours.
This just in:
The debate over the third runway in the Commons has been halted…
Great unhappiness.
John McDonnell MP has been suspended.
What hope for the future if this happens under a Labour government?
The debate over the third runway in the Commons has been halted…
Great unhappiness.
John McDonnell MP has been suspended.
What hope for the future if this happens under a Labour government?
Not London to Aberdeen it doesn't. I can leave work at 5pm and be in my parents house in Aberdeen by 10pm. The fastest train I can find from London to Aberdeen takes 6h53m. And that doesn't include the time taken to get to Kings Cross...
The Lib Dems are also opposed, so anything other than a sizeable New Labour majority following the next General Election should bring the whole thing to a grinding halt.
Unfortunately what an Opposition party says it will do can massively change the moment they cross the House.
The way this has been forced through is a disgrace. What is mildly amusing, however, is that - as an extra to the plan - the government is now considering throwing a "high speed rail link to Scotland" into the plans to appease the environmentalists. 
We've been sitting back for years and years in dire need of a high speed rail link - the likes of which France has had for 20-30 years now and even Spain and Italy now have - but yet they've never coughed up the £20-30bn needed, instead preferring to spend nearly as much on longer trains and tilting ones that don't work anyway. Even the huge success of the Eurostar seems to have escaped their notice...
This expansion plan just stinks of the decision to give the green light on a new generation of nuclear power. Not to mention the Iraq War. The plan is simple: wait a few months pretending they're debating all the options, then just ram through whatever they decided beforehand anyway, however unpopular with the British people. Oh how lazy and unwilling we are.
We've been sitting back for years and years in dire need of a high speed rail link - the likes of which France has had for 20-30 years now and even Spain and Italy now have - but yet they've never coughed up the £20-30bn needed, instead preferring to spend nearly as much on longer trains and tilting ones that don't work anyway. Even the huge success of the Eurostar seems to have escaped their notice...
This expansion plan just stinks of the decision to give the green light on a new generation of nuclear power. Not to mention the Iraq War. The plan is simple: wait a few months pretending they're debating all the options, then just ram through whatever they decided beforehand anyway, however unpopular with the British people. Oh how lazy and unwilling we are.
Be thankful that you have a public train system. I would have to drink 50 miles to get to one. And i can't go cross country.
Sure you can, just not on one train. My cousin did Seattle -> Providence, which was really Seattle -> Chicago, Chicago -> Washington, Washington -> Providence (on the Acela).
But if the train service was any good using high speed trains, it would probably be similar times. Add the fact that the train service is quieter and does not take air space for other flights.
I feel that the government are once again investing in something backward. While the rest of Europe are investing in rail the government invests in something we already have.
Also what bugs me is the idea that rail services need to be profitable and make big money when really they are part of necessary transport.
i am not familiar with the issues at stake, but if it helps making the worst airport in europe a little less bad, i am all for it.
Instead of spending all this money you could always just start landing on rivers like they do in the US.
"Speedbird 682 heavy, request taxi to the gate."
"BA 682, just sink to the bottom of the Thames. Good day"