With London City Airport forecasting passenger volumes will reach 3 million this year, the London hub has started a 10-week public consultation on how it can meet passenger demand over the coming decade.
Robert Sinclair, the airport’s CEO said: “London City Airport plays an incredibly important role in quickly and easily connecting London to the rest of the UK and the world for both business and leisure travel. The strength of our rebound demonstrates the huge pent-up demand for air travel and the need to plan responsibly for the future.”
The UK capital’s aviation market has rebounded strongly following the pandemic with the airport expect to surpass its current planning cap of 6.5 million passengers a year by the middle of this decade. The consultation plans outline how the airport has an integral role to play in meeting the increased demand in London, as well as providing more choice and flexibility for travellers planning flights both domestically and internationally. Importantly, growth to 9 million passengers per annum can be delivered without requiring any additional infrastructure and ahead of longer term, strategic, aviation planning decisions for other airports in the South-East.
Following the publication of the airport’s master plan in 2020, the airport is inviting views on additional flexibility to operate on a Saturday afternoon and evening, as well as additional flexibility in the first and last half hour of daily operations (06.30 – 07.00 and 22.00 – 22.30). These plans are accompanied with a commitment from the airport that only quieter, cleaner, new generation aircraft, such as the Airbus A220 and Embraer E2, would be allowed to fly in the new operating periods. This would bring forward the delivery of more of these aircraft to the airport and allow better connections to new destinations.
The consultation also explains how the current 8-hour night-time curfew will remain, as well as the current operating hours on Sunday, with no flights being permitted until early afternoon. No increase to the current annual limit on flights is proposed. In addition to meet its targets of achieving 80% of journeys to and from the airport by sustainable transport modes, no additional car parking is proposed either.
“These proposals set out how London City and its airlines can meet future demand in a sustainable way. In particular, it will accelerate investment in cleaner, quieter, new generation aircraft, for use in the extended periods, delivering the benefit of quieter aircraft to our local community throughout the whole week,” added Sinclair.
As well as creating additional choice for travellers with new connections to new destinations, according to London City the proposed changes will also contribute towards levelling up and deliver an additional 2,100 jobs, including 1,250 good quality, London Living Wage jobs directly from the airport’s operation, with a further 850 jobs created across London through its supply chain.
Warner Rootliep, Managing Director of KLM Cityhopper expressed his support for the proposed changes, saying: “London City is a key airport in our UK network, providing fast and convenient connections to and from the rest of hte world via KLM’s hub at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport.
“KLM has recently acquired a fleet of new generation Embraer E195-E2 aircraft, which is ideally suited to airports like London City, and more operational flexibility will help us grow this vital route using our new aircraft, reducing noise and emissions. We look forward to reviewing the proposals in detail.”
He was joined by Tom Stoddart, CEO of British Airways CityFlyer, who said: “We welcome these proposals, which will provide more choice and flexibility for our customers, increase local jobs and help to drive London’s economic recovery… We have a clear roadmap to get us to net-zero emissions by 2050, including flying more fuel-efficient aircraft, progressively introducing sustainable aviation fuel and looking at how we can help accelerate the growth of new technologies, such as zero emissions hydrogen-powered aircraft.”
