RABA Group sign Memorandum of Understanding with London Heathrow.
The Regional and Business Airports Group welcomes the Government’s recommendation that London Heathrow should be the preferred location for badly needed additional south east capacity.
As Heathrow has become increasingly congested many RABA member airports, have lost flights to, and been excluded from, the UK’s main international hub. In 1990, 18 UK regional airports had regular scheduled flights connecting their regions to Heathrow, today there are just 8 (and some of these links are quite tenuous in terms of frequency).
After months of dialogue, in 2016 Heathrow and RABA signed a Memorandum of Understanding to ensure slots will be secured for regional air services. Known as the “Regional Package” it is aimed at fleshing out Heathrow’s commercial offer to support domestic services – including a RABA-led review of how the £10m route development fund should be implemented – but also a joint approach to secure the regulatory package from the UK Government that will protect greater domestic connectivity in the longer term. This will ensure the new runway is transformative in its economic and inbound tourism effects for the UK as a whole and not just the south-east.
Chairman of RABA, Neil Pakey outlined why Heathrow is the best option for the regions, ‘It is imperative that the UK’s regions can rely on links to a global UK hub and not just rely on hubs outside of the UK to deliver our international connectivity. If anything, this is even more important in a post Brexit world. A properly specified and resourced national hub at Heathrow can fulfill this role much more satisfactorily than any alternative. By combining point-to-point traffic accessing London with transiting traffic from the UK regions heading to all parts of the world, Heathrow can be transformed into a global gateway serving not just London and the South East but the whole of the UK.’
As a next step, RABA intends to work with regional MPS and the other regional stakeholders that have an interest in exploiting the potential that such enhanced connectivity brings. ‘This will ensure that full advantage is taken of the business and trading opportunities that a new runway at Heathrow creates’, Pakey added. RABA are also aware of the continuing need to lobby government for the widest possible access for regional flights.
Neil Pakey talks more about Heathrow being the choice of regional aviation in this article for Business Travel News: http://www.btnews.co.uk/article/10845