Should the UK ban domestic flights?

[miklcct]

Customs?

If the destination of the passenger has customs facility, then it will be handled at the destination, just like transferring from international to domestic flights.

Otherwise, it will be unavoidable for the passenger to get it to pass customs at the final layover which has a custom facility.

 

[Bald Rick]

If the destination of the passenger has customs facility, then it will be handled at the destination, just like transferring from international to domestic flights.

At the airport then.

 

[Mike Machin]

Definitely not! For example, I live in the South Downs National Park but only five miles from Southampton airport. Pre-COVID I chould leave my rural home after breakfast having already checked-in on-line, drive to the airport, board the flight and travel to Manchester, Newcastle etc, and be at a meeting by around 9am. I cold spend the best part of the day in the city catching-up with clients, fly home and on a summer evening I can be in the garden cutting the grass by 6pm or so. Impossible by road or rail.

Long-distance rail is fine between a select few principal cities and London, but other than that it’s strictly for leisure travellers and pensioners with time on their hands. Time is money!

 

[squizzler]

Here in Jersey it is apparent that private aviation makes a rather large proportion of the planes coming and going during the pandemic. These planes are carrying a few people only and often rather long distance (many go across the Atlantic from Jersey, none of our commercial routes do that). The carbon emissions are disproportionately high in comparison with the carbon emissions per person of normal commercial flights, never mind that achieved by Ryanair's "pack-'em-cheek-by-jowel" peasant-carriers.

I know somebody who works in air traffic control who described a standout example and then remarked: 'and they have the cheek to tell us to re-use our supermarket carrier bags!'

Knocking private jets on the head (I don't include in this the real enthusiasts fortunate enough to indulge their passion with a Cessna) will bring many more carbon savings without affecting the common person's mobility.

 

[HSTEd]

Commercial aviation should become a single class affair, as most planes these days tend to be largely volume rather than mass limited

 

[Mikey C]

I think this is over stated. Yes passengers with luggage are less likely to change trains - but the vast majority of passengers to/from Heathrow that use rail to access the airport already do that (unless their destination is on the GWML towards Paddington or on the Piccadilly line towards Cockfosters).

An air passenger transferring in the airport to a domestic flight is doing that because of the speed / convenience (and price) of doing so compared to using another mode. Changing from plane to train is the big step due to the need to collect bags, get to station etc - further changes of train are a much smaller barrier.

Exactly. Changing planes, with your luggage automatically transferred to the next flight is a lot less hassle than having to collect luggage and catch a train

Especially as the person, say flying from Manchester to Jakarta, is unlikely to live near Manchester Piccadilly station, so even a direct HS2 train to Heathrow, still means a connection at the other end, whereas a train, driving or a taxi from Stockport or Bolton straight to the airport, gets all the "hassle" out of the way. You can check in your luggage at Manchester and forget about it.

Removing all domestic flights would mean that people would connect in the likes of Dubai or Abu Dhabi instead

 

[Tobbes]

A ban is ineffective (and pretty hard to sell in Britain) but the carrot and stick are a different matter. The optimal answer appeared to some colleagues and I to be driving modal shift from leisure travellers and cost-concious business travellers; so we looked at what would happen if you charged £500 passenger duty for any city pairs which were less than 3.5hrs by train (average journey time, not a single Adnois special!). We left open the transferring passenger argument by not imposing the tax on connecting flights of more than 2000nm (meaning that Cairo/Beirut would not be taxed whereas Cyprus would be).

The expected result was that the London/Central Belt would remain until HS2 (based on it getting times below 3.5hrs), and then would be scaled down to a handful of flights a day, but it would leave Highlands - London and Newquay flights untouched, along with flights from Southampton - Manchester. If the Scottish Government wanted to do something different from Inverness to the Central Belt, then they'd obviously be able to do so.

 

[Bald Rick]

A ban is ineffective (and pretty hard to sell in Britain) but the carrot and stick are a different matter. The optimal answer appeared to some colleagues and I to be driving modal shift from leisure travellers and cost-concious business travellers; so we looked at what would happen if you charged £500 passenger duty for any city pairs which were less than 3.5hrs by train (average journey time, not a single Adnois special!). We left open the transferring passenger argument by not imposing the tax on connecting flights of more than 2000nm (meaning that Cairo/Beirut would not be taxed whereas Cyprus would be).

The expected result was that the London/Central Belt would remain until HS2 (based on it getting times below 3.5hrs), and then would be scaled down to a handful of flights a day, but it would leave Highlands - London and Newquay flights untouched, along with flights from Southampton - Manchester. If the Scottish Government wanted to do something different from Inverness to the Central Belt, then they'd obviously be able to do so.

Extending from 2.5hrs (as per the French) to 3.5hrs rail journey doesn’t add many flights though? Basically London - Newcastle, London - Teeside, and that’s it I think. Maybe ten flights a day.

 

[Tobbes]

Extending from 2.5hrs (as per the French) to 3.5hrs rail journey doesn’t add many flights though? Basically London - Newcastle, London - Teeside, and that’s it I think. Maybe ten flights a day.

But it brings in the whole of London- Central Belt post HS2 Ph 2

 

[Bald Rick]

But it brings in the whole of London- Central Belt post HS2 Ph 2

It doesn’t though - post phase 2 journey times are 3h40 to Glasgow, 3h48 to Edinburgh.

 

[Tobbes]

It doesn’t though - post phase 2 journey times are 3h40 to Glasgow, 3h48 to Edinburgh.

Forgive me, I thought that both were targetting 3h 30.