Traffic Forecasts Don’t Take Into Account Commission's Own Night Flight Ban, Report Says

Gatwick Airport has published a full and detailed response to the Airports Commission Final Report pointing out what Gatwick officials say are key errors, omissions, and flaws as Sir Howard Davies’s recommendation for Heathrow expansion continues to unravel.

According to the report, just one of the key flaws in the report surrounds Sir Howard’s proposed ban on night flights at Heathrow. This would inevitably mean fewer services if applied, but this was not factored into the Airports Commission’s own traffic forecasts for Heathrow.

The restrictions would impact on the number of long haul flights to and from growth markets in the Far East – the issue at the heart of the decision to recommend Heathrow – further calling into question the robustness of the Commission’s analysis.

“We expected a well-considered examination of all options, but instead the final report contains so many omissions and basic errors that its reliability as the basis of aviation policy must be called into question. The findings of this report simply do not add up," said Gatwick CEO Stewart Wingate.

"Britain is in danger of losing out once again if we repeat mistakes of the past – Heathrow has failed time and again and the Airports Commission report and the conditions placed on expansion have not solved the huge obstacles confronting it.

“In recent weeks, it has become abundantly clear that Heathrow won’t meet these conditions, nor will they pay for the £6 billion in surface access improvements needed, and Heathrow’s airlines have shown they don’t want to pay for the runway. The recommendation for Heathrow is unravelling by the day," he said.

"I remain confident that when all the risks and benefits are properly considered, Gatwick will still represent the best option for UK airport expansion.”

The Commission used its traffic forecasts to calculate the potential economic benefits each airport would deliver and Gatwick’s response lists several fundamental assumptions that dramatically underplay traffic at Gatwick and overplay predictions for Heathrow, including:

• expecting Gatwick to reach 40 million passengers in 2024 whereas the airport will reach that number this year
• estimating that Gatwick will generate only two million passengers in the first year of operating with a second runway; in reality Gatwick grew by 2.7 million passengers last year with a single runway
• predicting that, after five years with a second runway, Gatwick will have an additional eight million passengers – less than it assumes Heathrow would have after one year with a third
• between 2025 –2030 Heathrow is assumed to grow by 36 million passengers compared to only 9 million at Gatwick.

In addition to drawing attention to the Commission’s flawed traffic forecasts, Gatwick’s full response highlights a range of other flaws in the Commission’s analysis, including:

• The Commission’s own economic analysis, following Treasury guidelines, shows that the economic value of each scheme is virtually the same. The Commission, however, emphasises and widely quotes the conclusions of PwC analysis, despite the Commission’s own expert panel urging caution about attaching significant weight to these results, stating that care is required in assessing its “robustness and reliability”.
• Air quality: the Commission’s analysis of air quality issues at Heathrow does not withstand scrutiny as its conclusions are based on an incorrect interpretation of the law. Its analysis is also incomplete and inconsistent in several material ways and relies upon a notional Air Quality Plan that is yet undrafted and so cannot at present be assessed. The Commission’s analysis confirms Gatwick’s assessment that Gatwick’s new runway can be delivered without exceeding the legally binding air quality limits.
• Noise: the Commission concludes that a three runway Heathrow will have a lower noise impact than a two runway Heathrow today. It also largely ignores the fact that Gatwick’s noise impacts would be an order of magnitude lower than Heathrow’s and has avoided meaningful assessment of Heathrow communities newly affected by noise.

(Images provided by Gatwick airport)

FMI: www.gatwickobviously.com/