Gatwick Needs a Second Runway It Has Lost It's Soul!

Whilst I agree with the Second Runway at Gatwick Airport I do not necessarily support everything the owners have done with the Airport since taking over from BAA.

I grew up around the Airport as my Dad worked there for 30 years starting with a bottom of the run job for an Airline before working his way into management there and as a child we spent a lot of time at the Airport and considered it one of our favourite days out. The airport was a vibrant little place almost like a city of people not only flying away but also the people that worked at the Airport.

Gatwick use to house the Village in the South Terminal which had many shops and restaurants and in the North Terminal was The Avenue which had much the same layout and I used to love going there with my Dad. We would go for a McDonalds and then take the Monorail across to the South Terminal and go into Skyview on the roof to watch the Aircraft for a while or visit the Nose of the Comet or take the tour of the Aircraft that had been placed on the roof for visitors.

When I turned 16 I began working in one of the shops in the South Terminal Departure Lounge and when on breaks myself and other staff would visit some of the Restaurants & Shops or head up to Skyview for a coffee on a good clear day.

Since the sale of Gatwick Airport I regularly fly out from either terminal and I have to say I have now got to the point that I try to arrive as close to my flight as possible as simply they have very little in way of shops or restaurants that even remotely interest me and everything mentioned above is no longer there, a lot of the shops are to high brow for passengers on Budget or Holiday airlines and the airport seem to think they are Terminal 5 at Heathrow.

The simple fact of this is that with the rise of Budget Airlines and the death of Long Haul scheduled services from the Airport that the face of the airport has changed and I for one do not feel this is for the best. The face of this change stands outside the North Terminal as a constant reminder in the shape of the 700 bedroom Premier Inn just a few feet away from a Sofitel which when built was designed to cater for Business passengers as (to my mind away) Premier Inn are aimed at the Budget Traveller.

So I do not think the management are always right on the development of "Our Airport" but I genuinely hope that the Second Runway would bring back Scheduled services to compete with easyJet and hopefully see shops and restaurants reopen, I can only imagine whats going to happen moving forward with British Airways leaving the North Terminal (Ironically they have been ousted from the terminal built to serve them by easyJet) I am sure some of the expensive shops in the Departure Lounge will not be to happy about this.

One of my biggest annoyances is in the shape of the lack of being able to be collected from outside the terminals and people forced to park, this is an absolute joke every airport in the world I have visited has a collection point except for Gatwick which is clearly just out to pay for its new car parks!

Gatwick Second Runway....Opposed By Council! Well Done Council More Common Sense!

I have lived in Crawley all my life and have grown up with the Airport on my doorstep and at one time or another most of my family have been employed at the airport and even more relatives who have been employed in Crawley as a consequence of having a major international airport on our doorstep.

Gatwick needs to expand to bring Crawley back to its former glory as I remember a town that was vibrant before Gatwick started dwindling down and we have a need in this country to expand our airports I travel Europe widely with my job and I have been in less busy airports that have 2 runways!

The council have annoyed me by opposing the second runway at Gatwick as they are not looking at what this would bring to the region and they are opposing this based on the infrastructure but surely the second runway would mean that the infrastructure would be upgraded to accommodate this. The jobs this would bring would mean more people living in the town and paying council tax so I don't see the problem (I will address the residents issues shortly). Everything takes so long these days to get anything started in this country let alone get it to the stage of completion. I have always found it strange that Gatwick is not more of a hub for Crawley bus routes to ensure workers have easy access to the airport when I started working at the airport in 1999 there was no way of me getting there except for a taxi it was not until 2000 that metrobus introduced Gatwick Direct and now 15 years later the number 10 has to go through town and the 200 is from Horsham but Tilgate and Furnace Green remain completely u reachable by bus to the busiest single runway airport in the world. Would this be allowed in any other forward thinking country? I read a comment earlier that said we are meant to be a democracy so where is the vote for local people to decide on a second runway rather than a bunch of councilors deciding what it is people want/need!

As for the residents they are beginning to frustrate me equally with the concerns over noise and aircraft movements. Firstly there can not be to many of these residents that didn't move into their homes before the existing airport was built and more importantly probably go on holiday and like the fact Gatwick is on there doorstep and use it when it suits them! I get that if you live on the flight path that noise is an issue but guess what you could move if it annoys you that much and maybe I am imagining it but aircraft have got substantially quieter since the days of DC10's and Tristar's taking off from Gatwick and will only continue to be more noise and fuel efficient as development of new aircraft continues.

I live near Gatwick and to be honest do not even notice the noise anymore bizarrely I notice more when they stop taking off for a runway closure or thunderstorm then I do with take offs every few minutes, I travel regularly and love having the airport on our doorstep.

That said Gatwick Airport are not perfect I feel the new owners have ripped the sole out of the place and even closing the drop off area to people being collected and having the cheek to charge local residents for the privilege is a real Liberty if you ask me as even the mighty Heathrow allow people to be picked up.

Surely though this is all a of the Governments own making let's not forget it was them that made BAA sell airports off and what they did was cause Gatwick and Heathrow to be competitors rather than sister airports and now they want to hold one back from competing on a level playing field, I can not imagine this happening in any other business!

Ultimately I feel this should be something that goes ahead and I think the airport should consider funds towards a new Crawley hospital as surely we should have more than one major hospital near an airport in the event of an accident East Surrey has enough new patients with all the housing being built.

There you go that's my 2p's worth not that it will matter unless more people use there voice to force change and a vote!