Standard speaks out on road traffic problems if Heathrow expands

As Heathrow Airport published more details about its plans for a third runway, media attention turned in part away from capacity issues in the air to the effect that an expanded airport would have on the road network around Heathrow’s west London home.

Rik Thomas

30 May 2014

An artist’s impression of the third Heathrow Airport runway at night... but will it every become a reality?

ON 13 MAY, London’s Evening Standard editorialised not just on the plans for a third runway at Heathrow Airport, but on how the road network would cope with expansion.

“What has caught the imagination most in the latest version of Heathrow’s expansion ambitions is highways not runways,” The Standard began. “The M25 plans referred to in its July submissions as simply ‘mitigation’ turn out to be a 600-metre tunnel stretching the length of one junction,...