Heathrow airport runway vote postponed to 2018

U.K. Transportation Secretary Chris Grayling said that the vote was again being pushed back due to the timing of the country’s recent national general election vote.

   The United Kingdom has once again pushed back a vote on whether to approve the construction of a third runway at Heathrow Airport, this time to 2018. It was the second delay since October 2016.
   U.K. Transportation Secretary Chris Grayling said in a July 13 statement, that the timing of the country’s recent general election, which was held in early June, played a part in the delay.
   The government initially approved the third runway last October, but said at the time that a vote by Parliament wouldn’t be held for about a year due to the then-upcoming early general election that Prime Minister Theresa May called for. The June 8 vote resulted in the number of seats held by May’s Conservative Party falling from 330 to 318, causing a hung parliament.
   However, Grayling indicated he is confident that the third runway will eventually be built.
   “This government is fully committed to realizing the benefits that a new north-west runway at Heathrow would bring, in terms of economic growth, boosting jobs and skills, strengthening domestic links and – critically – increasing and developing our international connectivity as we prepare to leave the European Union,” he said in the statement.
   “We now expect to lay any final NPS (National Policy Statement) in Parliament in the first half of 2018, for a vote in the House of Commons,” Grayling explained.
   Some in the industry, including Mark Whitehead of Hong Kong Air Cargo Terminals Ltd. and Coyne Airlines CEO Larry Coyne, have argued for years that a third runway at the ever-busier airport is crucial to preventing a cargo capacity crisis.
   Last December, U.K.-based air traffic control company NATS released a report that found airline delays would skyrocket over the next 15 years unless the country’s air infrastructure is upgraded soon. Annual airline delays would rise from their current cumulative total of 1,500 hours to an annual total of more than 66,500 hours by 2031, according to the study.