Heathrow must close If the government opts to expand Stansted or build a new estuary airport to create a new hub, an aviation think tank has said.
The Independent Transport Commission has come to the conclusion that a major capacity airport is needed to compete with European rivals, said the BBC, but if a new hub is built Heathrow will have to close to give investors confidence that airlines would move their business.
It has discounted other proposals including a dual hub linking Heathrow and Gatwick, developing regional airports to provide extra capacity or retaining Heathrow as a hub airport.
However, it said it does not believe enough consideration has been given to the possible loss of jobs or the potential cost of compensating airline businesses which have invested in Heathrow if the airport is to be shut to make way for a new hub airport.
Closing Heathrow would have "major impacts on the 114,000 people directly and indirectly employed by the airport as well as their families and the communities in which they live", it said.
But it said that releasing some 1,200 hectares of land – the size of Kensington and Chelsea – could offer "unparalleled opportunity for redevelopment for housing and other uses in a prime west London location".
Its report, Flying into the Future, put together with input from airport protest groups and airport authorities, will be submitted to the government’s Airports Commission.
Stephen Hickey, from the Independent Transport Commission, told the BBC: "Heathrow has now been overtaken by many of its competitors on mainland Europe and that will be a loss to the UK and London.
"At the moment we have the benefit of one of Europe’s top hub airports.
"The risk is we are losing that capacity to Charles de Gaulle, Frankfurt [and] Schiphol and the airlines will want to use those airports."
The Airports Commission will make its final report to the government in the summer of 2015.
