16 January 2012

The Thames Hub team welcomes the publication of the Civil Aviation Authority’s (CAA) Insight Note ‘Aviation Policy for the Future’ as part of its advice to the Department for Transport to help inform the development of a sustainable aviation policy framework for the UK.

Andrew Price, Halcrow’s chief economist and a member of the Thames Hub team, said:

“We agree with the CAA’s advice to the government that an aviation policy framework is needed to help make the right long term decisions about how to develop a sustainable aviation sector that can contribute to the UK’s economic growth whilst minimising its environmental impacts.

“Whilst there is scope to make better use of existing airports, the CAA’s advice to ministers is clear that short term non-infrastructure measures will be insufficient to provide the forecast level of capacity needed by passengers. Such measures will not alleviate the costs to the UK economy, in terms of lost investment and jobs, from current and future aviation capacity constraints.

“We support the CAA’s view that a successful aviation hub with direct connections to global markets is beneficial for both passengers and the economy. However Heathrow Airport, as the UK’s only global hub airport, is now operating at 98.5% capacity and the government has ruled out runway expansion there. The CAA believes that hub-and-spoke networks are unlikely to develop at regional airports and that a longer term solution is needed, in the form of significant additional aviation capacity in the South East of England.

“The CAA’s advice backs up our view that the government needs to give serious attention to the case for a new hub airport in the Thames Estuary, with significant additional capacity, and we believe that this would best be delivered as part of an integrated infrastructure development. We hope that the government will select this as an option for serious consideration when it announces how it intends to retain its aviation hub status in March.”