Heathrow isn’t crowded, it’s travellers walking on the wrong side, boss says | Heathrow airport
Heathrow Airport has revealed an overcrowding problem that a third runway cannot solve: British and foreign travelers walk from different sides and continue to collide, according to its chief executive.
Thomas Woldbye said that although Heathrow handled more passengers in a smaller overall area than comparable European hubs, part of London Airport’s problem was the different continental sense of orientation.
Speaking at a business event, the Danish boss said one of the reasons people thought Terminal 5, the main terminal used by British Airways, was crowded was because people were “in the wrong place”.
In his comments to Aviation Club UK, he said: “The problem is that all the British stay on the left and normally the Europeans stay on the right. And they do it both ways.
“So we can crash into each other, and I see that from personal experience.”
Woldbye said that while “I was joking with our people,” it was an issue that could be changed. “We just need to make sure that everyone this way stays to the left and that way stays to the right. I know it’s simplified but it’s the kind of thinking we need,” he said.
Heathrow will build more satellite terminals if it succeeds with its plans for a third runway, which could add around 40 million more passengers with varying directional preferences. The 240,000 additional flights per year will be managed by air traffic control.
Woldbye said that even with government-backed expansion, competing international hubs would grow faster than Heathrow. “London will lose market share every year for the next ten years. I think that should be a major concern,” he said.
Meanwhile, the airport is trying to address concerns that a third runway would be inconsistent with the UK’s net zero emissions targets for 2050 by accelerating the use of sustainable aviation fuels (SAF).
It created an £80m pot – funded by landing charges – to subsidize airlines that choose to use more SAF on top of the minimum required by national mandates.
The UK’s aviation fuel blend must average at least 3.6% SAF during 2026, but Heathrow hopes to meet a self-imposed target of 5.6%, helping airlines cover some of the extra cost of the cleaner, more expensive fuel.
Planes running on SAF – until now largely produced from recycled cooking oil – emit equal amounts of CO2 in flight as those using fossil fuels, but the net carbon footprint is calculated to be lower due to the “life cycle”, that is, the way it is produced compared to normal jet fuel. SAF is seen as a potential solution to significantly decarbonize long-haul aviation, although many remain skeptical.
Matt Gorman, director of sustainability at Heathrow, said: “We have sought to use our size and influence to attract SAF and we have shown that you can make SAF work. The next challenge is to boost domestic production – from a carbon perspective, but also energy security and growth.”
Duncan McCourt, chief executive of industry group Sustainable Aviation, said the government’s promises to start building five fuel plants in the UK by 2025 were “optimistic”, with none yet under construction, but added they were making progress. “There is a real opportunity for economic growth, for tens of thousands of jobs in the UK by 2050,” McCourt said.
Provisional figures released this week showed that supply for 2025 met the UK’s first annual fuel mandate of 2% SAF, with strong uptake in the final months of the year after fears the industry would miss the target.
