Are they?

As I understand it, these will be the new colours…

http://www.airliners.net/photo/Boeing/Boeing-787-8-Dreamliner/1570859/&sid=8f847afbebdf83f975ee6e809b7586d0

I’m being a bit naughty with this response as I have simply taken it from an earlier post, but updated it a touch to reflectthe new information, but basically copied and pasted to save my poor fingers.

I wonder though Andy whether R3 at LHR would still be a better alternative to R2 at STN? We’re likely to need one or the other either way and I’d have thought, despite it’s environmental concerns, LHR would make more sense? I don’t know what you think?

For a start it would be a planning nightmare, if anyone thinks any inquiry for LHR will be a pig, imagine the inquiry dealing with all the protesters and local authorities involved in a 400 mile rail line (or two, because one would need to go up the west of the country, and one up the east). Again, the French have achieved this because they decide they want to build a TGV track, and they do it. One of the main advantages they have is space, they have a population of similar size to the UK, but with a country substantially bigger, therefore building a relatively straight track there is going to come across less conurbations than an equivelant in the UK.

What is often forgotten about rail is that it does have environmental impact. The system would need to be electric, so residents living close to the rail line would not be subjected to large air quality issues, but they would suffer badly on noise. Think how many properties a 350 mile rail track to Glasgow (on the STRAIGHEST line on a map, so in truth add a fair few miles to that) would pass. If you accept that rail is less polluting per passenger km than air then you will need to recognise that trains travelling at higher speeds will require more energy, and therefore will require higher outputs from polluting powerstations.

There would be substantial land take and associated Compulsory Purchase Orders making it a legal nightmare. Properties would be cut in half and there would be Human Rights issues left right and centre. Infact I suspect a plan for such a link would never make it beyond a Judiciary Review from anyone that challenged a political decision, and there would be a lot more challenges than any Heathorw decision would generate.

I don’t even know where to begin with regards to the effects on Sites of Special Scientific Interest, Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty, National Parks and all the other ways in which we protect our natural landscape and habitats. I should think Swampy’s little head would explode with the decision of where to set up camp to prevent the building of such a track…..he’s just too busy opposing Rwy3 at LHR to have considered this yet. If the environmentalists got their way and were offered two direct, ultra high speed lines, they’d freeze and panic……instead of campaigning against aviation, they should be campaigning against travel full stop!!!!

The actual cost would be huge too, and could probably never be operated profitably given the CAPEX just to get the system up and running, let alone maintaining it. GLA, BA and LHR are all profit making organisations, ok the airlines get a tax break on fuel, but there is a tax income to the government from air travel. The CAPEX to build these rail links, along with the ongoing maintenance and the actual operating costs would probably lead to a situation as presently seen with the railways where the government would need to substantially subsidise the system. Don’t forget, the current train operating companies don’t take much actual revenue from ticket sales (except on specialised tickets they sell), overall they give all the money to the Govt. and then the government gives them money back based on how much they tendered to operate various services. The pot into the govt. is smaller than the pot out, so the taxpayer is already subsidising every rail user, and with a high speed rail link this burden would only get worse, even accepting that a small number of long distance trains could be cut from the current network.

On the basis of ‘polluter pays’ then is a high speed rail line through Cumbria really fair on those living there? The chances are such a link wouldn’t stop in Carlisle, so to take advantage of this the Cumbrians would have to travel to Glasgow or Manchester (it’s not worth having lots of stops because it would add time, and remove the advantage of direct rail links). However, the Cumbrians who are affected by the track would gain no advantage for their suffering of noise, and if there is a reduction in stopping Glasgow – London trains then the frequency of services from Carlisle to London would be reduced potentially affecting the local economy, either existing, or its ability to attract inward investment. I’m not saying everyone affected by a third runway will be a ‘user’ and therefore ‘polluter’, but my guess is most of them will have flown from there at some point in their life, many will work there, and many will profit from the economy that is London which is propped up on the world economic stage by LHR.

This article is nowhere near as bad as some articles I’ve seen, like for example the BBC’s ‘Ryanair Jet In Death Plunge From The Skies’ (or words to that effect)….

Paul

Well stop reading The Sun, The Mirror, The Mail and The Express then!! 😉

Are you some kind of communist? 😮

😉

Damn, ratted out!!

Why not call it the An225?

That way, people would know what you were talking about.

It also has less characters, so would have taken less effort to type!!

BA oneworld partner IB also offers BOB so its not as if they would be the first ”legacy” carrier to do so.

The US carriers have been instigating this for some time now, with the like sof AA and US introducing Buy-on-Board. A US Airways representative (could have been CEO, I can’t remember off hand) recently said that they were pleased other airliens were intorducing it too, as the industry had to modernise, I suspect though he’s pleased because it was a service differentiator which was working against US until the others introduced it in a more widespread way.

A UK historical society once reported in its magazine that two years earlier, all members making its organised trip to France had thought that the food in the hotel was terrible. On their latest trip, the hotel had closed its restaurant for renovation, so no food was available. It was generally agreed that this was a great improvement.

Having been foolish enough to have tried a mouthful of a British Aeroflot sandwich during a flight to Italy a couple of years ago, I’d consider no food to be a great improvement. But I’m old enough to remember the days when at least one airline – British United – provided a full meal on London to Italy routes.

This is a point I’ve long been making. If you buy a cup of tea onboard it tends to be of a decent size, with hot water poured over a tea bag. If you get free tea on board, it tends to be half a mouthful in a tiny cup (well half a mouthful for my big mouth) from a tea pot which was brewed 20 minutes eralier and is so thick you can leave the plastic spoon stood up in it.

In some respects, the complimetary meals are much the same. I think if they move to BOB then yes, it has to be decent quality, but you’ll get more than half a mouthful of nasty sandwich is you spend some money.

My colleauges were just talking about this in the office and saying that even recently, they’ve had awful refreshements from the legacy carriers (not just BA) and that they’d prefer to pay for them to know they’ll get something of a decent size and hopefully quality.