If Heathrow finally builds its third runway, Londoners can expect hundreds more planes flying overhead each day. But greater congestion on the ground will be a problem too. Under Heathrow’s £33bn expansion plan, 100,000-200,000 more passengers would eventually be travelling to or from the airport each day.
The most eye-catching problem has been moving part of the UK’s busiest motorway, the M25, to make space for a new 2.2-mile (3.5km) runway. A thornier one may be getting motorists out of their cars, and finding more sustainable ways for the extra passengers – and thousands of staff – to travel to and from Heathrow. Although ride-sharing, coaches and buses can play a part, scaling up rail is the clear alternative.
Space on the existing line is, however, at a premium, and the Elizabeth line, built with a promise of connecting business travellers swiftly and directly from Heathrow to the City and Canary Wharf, only has limited paths. With everything up for negotiation, transport experts are asking: has the time come to kill off the Heathrow Express? The obvious airport train, as unwary visitors often find out too late, may not be the best one.
The Heathrow Express, which charges a whopping £26 for a 15- to 21-minute one-way hop, was long one of the most expensive airport connections around (at least until it was overtaken by the Luton Dart). It is, as advertised, technically the fastest way to central London, though passengers travelling beyond Paddington may reach their destination more quickly on the Elizabeth line or even the tube on a direct route. For those who value the speed – in addition to TV news, a toilet and a luggage rack – it may be the perfect service.
But the Heathrow Express was only used by 4.5 million passengers last year, a figure that represents, at best, less than 6% of Heathrow’s air passengers, with the number bolstered by airport staff on heavily discounted tickets. Transport for London (TfL) has signalled its belief that the service’s time is up, as the government consults on its Heathrow expansion national policy statement. MPs must approve the statement for the runway to go ahead.
That no longer seems automatic: Andy Burnham’s long-term scepticism over a third runway, along with the loss of Rachel Reeves in No 11 as a champion of expansion, makes Downing Street support look ambivalent at best – even given the new chancellor’s belated assertion that the “economic case stacks up”. However many runways the airport has, TfL said it was “worth reviewing [the Heathrow Express’s] future in the context of determining the optimal mix of services on the Great Western mainline to make the most effective use of the limited capacity available”. For TfL, the Elizabeth line, going deeper and cheaper into the heart of London, is “a more compelling service”.
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