Air travel is booming. Heathrow is having day after day of record passenger numbers. While there are some headwinds on consumer sensitivity to price – Michael O'Leary, Ryanair boss, recently said consumers will only travel 'at a price' – air travel looks set to keep soaring.
I am the independent chair of the Heathrow Area Transport Forum ('HATF'). This statutory group was formed in 1995 but mandated at the time of the initial discussions around a third runway. We bring together all the major stakeholders with an interest in surface access – TfL, airlines, taxis, local authorities, the airport and others.
Our main objectives this year are to boost bus travel, tackle off airport nuisance parking and help garner consensus around the Heathrow Southern Railway project.
How are these extra passengers, staff and cargo going to get to and from the airport? Already half of existing passengers arrive in a vehicle of some sort. Road access is constrained and large increases in vehicle movements are not going to be acceptable for residents, hauliers or passengers – the M25 and M4 are already very busy. Heathrow Southern Railway (HSR' Home - Heathrow Southern Railway) is a solution to quite a few of these problems. Access to the airport from the southwest of London and beyond is not great. We are trying to get the Feltham interchange improved but this will only ever provide a partial solution.
HSR is a private sector solution which contains several options. New lines, largely in tunnels, could connect existing SWR services directly to Terminal 5, Paddington and beyond. The hugely successful Elizabeth line could reach Staines. Places like Basingstoke, Guildford and Woking would be directly connected to the airport and passengers would potentially have, via interchange at Staines, faster journey times to their central London destinations. In addition, the new lines would provide additional resilience to services going into London via Clapham Junction and Waterloo.
Look at the attached picture – guess what could lie behind that innocuous looking door? Yes, a giant, empty concrete box ready to be fitted out! What is extraordinary is that people years ago had the foresight to build the Terminal 5 underground 'box' rail station in a way that could cope with future extending of the line.
When the Terminal 5 connection started in 2005 a huge extra underground space was created to eventually cope with extending the line beyond the airport southwards. I had the great privilege to see this box recently. An amazing space. So, a huge chunk of the work and money has already been sunk! We just need to push on and finish this vision.
The Elizabeth Line could be extended to Staines giving the town a direct airport link, very useful for staff as well, for the first time. Sustainable travel opportunities right across the southeast would be boosted. To misquote Churchill – never has so little track given so much to so many! 13km of track, mostly in tunnels, would transform the transport options for millions.
The big question is how will this be paid for? Access to the new lines will provide a long-term income – but that requires TfL and DfT/National Train Operator to ideally commit to some longer-term access. However, there will clearly have to be some promise of investment upfront from a mixture of the parties that will benefit.
So, a great scheme that will boost sustainable growth with private sector money. As the chair of HATF I have recently written to the new Secretary of State for Transport expressing my support for the scheme. You can see it here:
https://www.hatf.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Heathrow-Southern-Rail-HATF-letter-to-SoS.pdf
Let's get behind this great, potentially transformative plan.
