British Airways and bmi will drop routes if new Heathrow runway is not built
Airlines are threatening to drop several domestic routes from their schedules unless the Government makes a commitment to build a third runway at Heathrow airport.
According to The Times’ transport correspondent Ben Webster, both British Airways and bmi have stated that they want a new runway at the airport within 10 years, and that only such a move will maintain Heathrow’s position as the leading hub in Europe.
The two carriers have listed Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Belfast, Manchester, Teeside and Leeds-Bradford as airports that could lost their connections with Heathrow. BA’s director of Government affairs told the newspaper: “If the Government were to choose not to build a third runway at Heathrow then the inevitable consequence over time is the decline of regional services.”
Dan Hodges, of the campaign group Freedom to Fly, added: “Unless ministers give the green light for new infrastructure we face an axing of domestic aviation that will stand comparison with Beeching’s axing of rail services in the 1960s.”
