Birmingham Airport Master Plan 2018

Birmingham Airport to invest £500 million to grow passengers to 18 million by 2033
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• The draft Master Plan outlines ambitious plans to grow by 40% to 18 million passengers per year by 2033.
• Birmingham Airport is opening its plans to the public from today with an extensive consultation that will run to the end of January to seek views from local communities and stakeholders
• The Plan reaffirms the Airport’s commitment to serve the region and its communities, increasing its contribution to the local economy from £1.5 billion to a forecast £2.1 billion a year and 34,000 jobs in 2033.
• An investment of around £500m will increase capacity and vastly improve the passenger experience, to make Birmingham one of Europe’s leading regional airports.

Birmingham Airport has today (Tuesday 6th November 2018) launched its draft Master Plan, titled,‘The Midlands Gateway to the World’. The Plan sets out in detail how the Airport will make a self-financed new investment of £500 million over the life of the plan to improve, modernise and extend facilities that will deliver increased capacity for our airline customers and enhance the passenger experience.

The draft Master Plan further reinforces the integral part the Airport plays as a catalyst for growth across the Midlands and in the UK’s economic prosperity. It outlines the Airport’s role in driving future economic benefit to the region which will increase by 42%, totalling £2.1 billion a year and 34,000 jobs by 2033.

A greater choice of flights and destinations, alongside improved regional connectivity and a direct link to HS2, are vital to the continued growth of the region’s thriving economy. The global markets to which the Airport connects help to drive international trade, investment, employment, inbound tourism and the success of the region’s many universities.

The Airport will continue to improve air links for people in the region, providing more flights to cultural hubs, business centres and a greater choice of outbound holiday destinations. It will continue to expand the existing wide range of short-haul and long-haul scheduled and charter services and destinations, with both full-service and low-cost airlines.

Building on existing commitments to sustainability and community support, the draft Master Plan demonstrates how growth to become one of Europe’s leading regional airports will be balanced with a responsibility to the environment and the people who live and work in the Airport’s vicinity.

This ambitious yet sustainable plan is focussed on addressing the key constraints to more rapid growth. This will involve a major expansion of the terminal facilities, the construction of additional new aircraft stands and working with national agencies and regional partners to deliver improved public and road transport surface access for passengers.

All of the forecast demand growth is fully achievable on the existing single runway which has the physical capacity to handle 25 to 30 million passenger movements a year. The draft Master Plan also follows recently restated Government policy of making the best use of the UK’s existing runways.

Simon Richards, Acting Managing Director, Birmingham Airport, said:

“Birmingham Airport is already the preferred national and international aviation hub for the Midlands and our ambition is to build on this to become one of Europe’s leading regional airports, acting as a key economic accelerator, delivering great service to passengers, and helping to showcase the region.

“Over the next 15 years, we will expand and significantly improve the Airport to maximise our potential as a single runway airport by investing £500 million. Our plans take account of our forecast growth and will increase operational efficiency for our airlines and partners and improve the experience for our passengers.”

Andy Street, Mayor of the West Midlands, said:

“Birmingham Airport is a key part of an economy that is growing faster than anywhere else in the UK and it is important we invest and grow this asset to ensure it keeps being a driver of prosperity.

“These bold plans will not only see a huge investment by the airport but commit to using the existing single runway to drive this growth. For my part, I will work with the airport and key partners like HS2 and the NEC Group to ensure we deliver the world-class facility our region and country deserves.”

Neil Rami, Chief Executive, West Midlands Growth Company, said:

“The West Midlands has firmly established itself as the UK’s driver of growth, fostering centres of excellence in business and leading the country’s traditional sectors – such as manufacturing and engineering.

“The region lies on the cusp of a period of great economic growth, supported by major infrastructure projects such as HS2, that will help attract more people and investment than ever before. To realise this potential, we are committed to working with our partners at Birmingham Airport to showcase the region to the world.”

Birmingham Airport details in the Plan its commitment to working closely with partners across the region, playing its part in driving growth. The Plan highlights how important factors such as public transport and highways improvements are to ensure the Airport is able to reach its potential.

Alongside the draft Master Plan, the Airport will be consulting on a new draft Surface Access Strategy. This will outline how it will meet growth requirements and targets, as well as continuing to work in collaboration with transport bodies and operators.

The launch of this draft Master Plan triggers the start of a 12-week public consultation for stakeholders to feed back their views on the Airport’s Plans. A number of public exhibitions will take place throughout the West Midlands from the 12th November to the 22nd January 2019. The consultation period will end on the 31st January at 23:59.

Full details of the plan and how to feedback can be found at www.bhxmasterplan.co.uk

 

I very rarely use the railways these days but from what I understand the current network is massively under capacity with severe overcrowding and to upgrade it to the standard required would (as said above) cost almost as much as HS2. It seems as if a new line is needed and if you are going to build one then you might as well make it a high speed one.

Are not most rail users complaints about their experience on local/commuter services that they use every day? I don.t see how HS2 helps alleviate that..My other fear is that high speed will mean high fares so most of us will still be using New Street and whatever companies
have the franchises then.I guess it would mean these companies reducing the often sparsely occupied first class carriages and replacing with standard. Then they have to sell the seats. Fares become cheaper. more people use them,back where we are now..

 

Are not most rail users complaints about their experience on local/commuter services that they use every day?

Apparently it will free up track on the non high speed lines for more local services.

 

Apparently it will free up track on the non high speed lines for more local services.

How can it free up capacity ?
Nothing changes on the local line - unless Virgin / Cross Country / London NorthWest reduce their services ?

 

How can it free up capacity ?
Nothing changes on the local line - unless Virgin / Cross Country / London NorthWest reduce their services ?

From what I read a while ago it means that the higher speed services shift to the high speed line allowing more use of the slower speed line by local services.

 

The current situation: fast intercity, slow commuter & freight all use the same lines. In order to fit all of these services in, large gaps have to be left after slow trains so the fast intercity trains don't catch them up, or they're required to have long stops at stations where there are through tracks so the fast intercity trains can pass by.

The idea behind HS2 is to move the fast intercity trains over to a new purpose built line. This would allow more services to operate on the existing tracks as they would all be operating at the same speed and hence could be spaced closer together.

Virgin recently lost the WCML franchise. The new franchise has been awarded to First Trenitalia West Coast Rail with the franchise covering the existing WCML intercity services (currently Virgin Trains) until HS2 opens, after which the franchise will run HS2 services.

Those against HS2, what would you suggest instead? And if your answer is to 'upgrade' the existing network, what 'upgrade' would that be exactly?

 

Those against HS2, what would you suggest instead? And if your answer is to 'upgrade' the existing network, what 'upgrade' would that be exactly?

At the end of the day the vast majority of rail passengers are not travelling between big cities.HS2 will serve a purpose but will make no difference to most unless they decide to reduce the services the franchises currently operate between the cities and force people to use HS2.Most people are not bothered if it takes 90 mins or 1 hour to travel to London.
As for Birmingham's roll as an interchange that could be interesting if current inter city services are reduced to accommodate more local services.
Say Telford to Leeds. Currently one change at New St
Possibly in the future
Telford - New St
New St - Curzon St by tram (HA HA)
High speed Curzon St to Bham Interchange.. Change trains
High speed Bham Interchange to Leeds.

The current network for all it faults will have to keep operating as it is for some time whilst HS2 finds its market.
.It is a growing market and we cannot afford to do anything else.

 

Birmingham Airport master plan?????
Perhaps there should be a new thread HS2

 

Birmingham Airport master plan?????
Perhaps there should be a new thread HS2

Haha true! To be fair, there was an article about how scrapping HS2 could put BHX's masterplan in doubt so there is somewhat of a link.

 

Birmingham Airport master plan?????
Perhaps there should be a new thread HS2

As said, it all started because of speculation that the BHX master plan relies on HS2. Will keep an eye on it though and if it goes too far I'll move the conversation elsewhere.

 

Will keep an eye on it though and if it goes too far

Unlike HS2

 

Have the details of the "higher growth" plan been posted here yet? It includes the following -

Our forecast is that 94 narrow body equivalent stands will be required for 24 million passengers per year in the high case, which is 25 more than under the base case scenario at a similar annual utilisation of 260,000 passengers per stand. We have given careful consideration to how the apron might be expanded to accommodate this growth. The conclusion we have reached is that extending the apron southwards into the area of the car hire village, car park 4 and car park 5 represents the only practicable option if very significant disadvantages are to be avoided.

 

I thought I saw increasing aircraft parking space was the last item to be carried out

 

The 80's stands will be re-modelled very soon