We can’t wait for a new runway: Let’s fast-track better rail connections to our airports
The government has already taken a crucial decision on future airport capacity by opting for a new runway at Heathrow. But it won’t be built for 15 years and so the shorter-term focus should be on how we maximise existing capacity.
Passengers need fast, efficient public transport to and from their flights, and all of London’s airports would benefit from improved rail connections.
Nowhere is this truer than at easyJet’s home base: London Luton Airport. Luton is the fastest-growing airport in London, yet is the only one without an Express-style rail service. The new East Midlands rail franchise, due to begin from 2018, is a chance to change this.
Doing so would support three of the government’s priorities: meeting passenger demand for air travel, boosting economic growth, and improving connectivity both between North and South and East and West across the Oxford-Cambridge corridor.
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Most significantly, it requires no new capital spending or public money.
Luton Airport is already doing its bit. It is investing £110m to transform the airport and increase capacity by 50 per cent to 18m passengers per year. Work is well underway on site and on track for completion in 2020.
At the same time, Luton Borough Council is working with the airport to improve the last mile of the journey between Luton Airport Parkway station and the terminal. A £200m light rail link will have replaced the existing shuttle bus by 2020, meaning that total journey time to London St Pancras could be less than 30 minutes.
That journey time depends on fast and frequent train services. But currently, of 160 East Midlands trains that pass through the station every day, only 16 actually stop.
Changing that requires simple amendments to the timetable; there is no need for new infrastructure, meaning there is no cost to the public purse. But the impact would be significant.
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First and foremost, by encouraging more passengers on to public transport, independent analysis shows that fare revenue, much of which would flow back to government, would increase by up to £110m a year.
Second, it would boost economic growth. Luton Airport’s current expansion is already set to add an extra £1bn per year to the economy by 2030, on top of the £2,000 a minute in Gross Value Added it already produces. Improved rail connections will both accelerate that growth and open up new opportunities, not least at the government sponsored airport enterprise zone.
Not only that, but Luton sits at the heart of two of the UK’s most vital economic corridors.
Having more trains stop at Luton Airport will benefit passengers coming to and from Sheffield, Nottingham, Derby and Leicester, as well as those travelling to and from London. Luton also sits within the strategically important Oxford-Cambridge corridor, meaning it can become an integrated road, rail and air hub linking the two.
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Better public transport will also help keep over 70,000 cars off the M1 each year. This will reduce congestion and cut expected CO2 emissions by around 500 tonnes a year.
As well as easyJet, all three major business organisations – the CBI, FSB and Chamber of Commerce – have supported the proposal.
Now we hope that the government will get on-board too.