Massive expansion planned at Liverpool

I’m surprised this one so far seems only to have made the local papers:
http://icliverpool.icnetwork.co.uk/thebusinessweek/regionalnews/tm_objectid=17376763%26method=full%26siteid=50061-name_page.html#story_continue

Willism

(From the Liverpool Daily Post website, as aboce:)

A £600m vision for Liverpool superport
Jul 13 2006

Deborah James outlines plans to transform Liverpool’s maritime and air cargo links over the next 25 years

Daily Post

AROUND £600m will be invested in Liverpool John Lennon Airport if all elements of an ambitious masterplan to treble passenger numbers and create the UK’s first “superport” succeed.

Airport executives yesterday unveiled broad details of a “transformational vision” they hope will revitalise Liverpool as a major port both for maritime and air freight in the next 25 years.

They announced major plans for a new World Cargo Centre to increase freight handling 15-fold to 220,000 tonnes a year, on Green Belt farmland around the former historic village of Oglet.

Yesterday, the Daily Post revealed the airport wants to build a new road link to relieve congestion around the airport for traffic travelling from the east, including cars crossing the Runcorn Bridge.

The draft plan for 2030 outlines three possible options for the road, called the eastern access transport corridor (EATC), which is expected to be a dual carriageway with a built-in cycle lane.

The first option, favoured by JLA’s management, is the shortest route. It would bring traffic from Speke Boulevard near the Jaguar factory, round the back of the Speke estate.

Road options two and three would start farther up Speke Road (A561), which leads to the Runcorn Bridge and M62, nearer to the junction with the A5300, which leads to the M57.

The airport’s terminal buildings would also be expanded to cope with passenger numbers tripling, from around 4.5m in 2005 to 12.3m in 2030.

And the runway would be extended by around half a kilometre inland, to allow JLA to take wider long-haul planes like Boeing 767s and Airbus 330s, capable of flying as far as Shanghai.

The aim is to open up more routes both for passenger flights to the US hubs, and for freight links with the Far East, particularly with emerging markets in India and China, and the Middle East.

The entire plan would create a total of somewhere between 7,000 and 9,000 extra jobs, which could take the number employed directly and indirectly from 2,300 today, to 11,300 by 2030.

Any environmental impact is hoped to be offset by the opening up of a further 124 acres (50 hectares) for public use as an extension of the Mersey Waterfront Coastal Park.

It would link up with the Mersey Way footpath and the Pennine Way, and “provide a wide range of habitats for wildlife, with a proposal to include visitor facilities,” according to the plan.