| UK internal flights 09:29 - Mar 12 with 1861 views | StokieBlue |
Whilst France has banned all internal flights which can't be replaced with a train journey of less than 2.5 hours [*] the UK has actively sought to increase UK domestic flights by making them cheaper:
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/mar/12/revealed-uk-airline-industrys-pu
"A controversial new cut in air passenger tax due next month was passed after the airline industry told the government it would lead to a new era of “ultra low” prices for domestic flights in the UK, with one airline predicting a 31% rise in passengers, industry documents reveal"
Really not a good look. If they focused more on improving the trains then nobody should really need to take domestic flights within the UK with a few exceptions. Just seems a needless increase in emissions rather than dealing with the underlying issues.
SB
[*] https://www.euronews.com/green/2022/12/02/is-france-banning-private-jets-everyth |  |
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| UK internal flights on 09:48 - Mar 12 with 1760 views | NthQldITFC |
History will look back at this government as a hideous, out-of-touch, kleptomaniac, national reputation-destroying bunch of future-eating scum bags.
That will be their legacy. |  |
| # WE ARE STEALING THE FUTURE FROM OUR CHILDREN --- WE MUST CHANGE COURSE # | | Poll: | It's driving me nuts |
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| UK internal flights on 09:48 - Mar 12 with 1757 views | Pinewoodblue |
You might want to edit the first bit by adding, after internal flights, ‘except those’.
Fly, once a year, from Stansted to City of Derry airport there is no viable alternative. |  |
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| UK internal flights on 10:05 - Mar 12 with 1713 views | GlasgowBlue |
I’ll be honest, I was a big internal flight user back in the day.
In the late 90’s/early 2000’s I was living in Scotland and working just outside London. Back then you could fly Ryanair from between 50p - £5 each way so it was really convenient as I could leave Glasgow at 7am on a Monday and be home by 8pm on a Friday.
Same with taking my boy to Portman Road a decade later, although by then the cheap flights were a thing if the past. I could leave home at 7am, get to Portman Road and be back at home in time for Match of the Day.
I wouldn’t have been able to do either by train.but both journeys were obviously over 2.5 hours on a train. [Post edited 12 Mar 2023 10:05]
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| UK internal flights on 10:17 - Mar 12 with 1666 views | Churchman |
| UK internal flights on 10:05 - Mar 12 by GlasgowBlue |
I’ll be honest, I was a big internal flight user back in the day.
In the late 90’s/early 2000’s I was living in Scotland and working just outside London. Back then you could fly Ryanair from between 50p - £5 each way so it was really convenient as I could leave Glasgow at 7am on a Monday and be home by 8pm on a Friday.
Same with taking my boy to Portman Road a decade later, although by then the cheap flights were a thing if the past. I could leave home at 7am, get to Portman Road and be back at home in time for Match of the Day.
I wouldn’t have been able to do either by train.but both journeys were obviously over 2.5 hours on a train. [Post edited 12 Mar 2023 10:05]
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I had to do the journey in reverse a good few times (London to Glasgow). Done it by train too and for a trip like that, flying is far more sensible.
However, invest in high speed trains and make the prices realistic, even if that means (shock horror) subsidy and people won’t choose air travel for sorter journeys. You have to make it viable and make it work. Pricing people out of transport is not an integrated transport plan. It’s a business and in turn an economy killer in my view.
But our government has never been interested in transport infrastructure. Flogging it off for peanuts and a seat on the Board is the closest they ever got to a flicker of interest. |  | | |
| UK internal flights on 10:59 - Mar 12 with 1609 views | GlasgowBlue |
| UK internal flights on 10:17 - Mar 12 by Churchman |
I had to do the journey in reverse a good few times (London to Glasgow). Done it by train too and for a trip like that, flying is far more sensible.
However, invest in high speed trains and make the prices realistic, even if that means (shock horror) subsidy and people won’t choose air travel for sorter journeys. You have to make it viable and make it work. Pricing people out of transport is not an integrated transport plan. It’s a business and in turn an economy killer in my view.
But our government has never been interested in transport infrastructure. Flogging it off for peanuts and a seat on the Board is the closest they ever got to a flicker of interest. |
The Mrs and had a weekend in London last April. Took the train from Edinburgh and it was great. Just 4 hours and only three stops.
Very relaxing drinking a bottle of Champagne and playing scrabble. | |
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| UK internal flights on 11:22 - Mar 12 with 1553 views | stonojnr |
even without that tax,UK internal flights are still much cheaper than UK trains.
its crazy, I need to go to Liverpool at the end of the month, but because of the train strikes cant book an advance ticket, even though they arent striking on the days I need to travel.
so its likely to end up being full fare which is going to be at least £100-£150 just one way.
whereas cheapest flight I can get from Stansted to Liverpool is £36. what would you do ?
maybe the french can ban internal flights because they have a high speed train network, whereas we spend all our time complaining that we dont need highspeed train networks like HS2, because they only cut a few mins off train journeys.
whilst that disparity exists in our railway network and its ticket prices, there will always be a market for internal flights, and even if you banned all internal flights I bet actually most people would drive instead, in their single occupancy cars, because actually trying to get around this country by train is a complete b***ache unless youre going to London, it really doesnt work that well. |  | | |
| UK internal flights on 11:27 - Mar 12 with 1535 views | Keno |
I know this might sound a tad daft but maybe we need a modern rail network that connects all part of the country with a high speed reliable service that is state owned so that prices can be maintained at affordable levels to encourage usage.
sorry thats just silly isnt it |  |
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| UK internal flights on 12:30 - Mar 12 with 1425 views | J2BLUE |
| UK internal flights on 11:27 - Mar 12 by Keno |
I know this might sound a tad daft but maybe we need a modern rail network that connects all part of the country with a high speed reliable service that is state owned so that prices can be maintained at affordable levels to encourage usage.
sorry thats just silly isnt it |
And then once it's fully functional, paid for and working, we sell it right? For a cut price? To a Tory donor? |  |
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| UK internal flights on 15:02 - Mar 12 with 1253 views | StokieBlue |
| UK internal flights on 09:48 - Mar 12 by NthQldITFC |
History will look back at this government as a hideous, out-of-touch, kleptomaniac, national reputation-destroying bunch of future-eating scum bags.
That will be their legacy. |
Well, the PM certainly isn't worried about saving energy:
"Rishi Sunak’s new private heated swimming pool uses so much energy that the local electricity network had to be upgraded to meet its power demands, the Guardian has been told.
While many Britons are facing increased electricity bills — and are trying to limit their energy usage — extra equipment was recently installed in a remote part of North Yorkshire to provide extra capacity from the National Grid to the prime minister’s constituency home."
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/mar/12/rishi-sunak-has-electricity-gri
SB | |
| Avatar - IC410 - Tadpoles Nebula |
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| UK internal flights on 16:33 - Mar 12 with 1086 views | blueasfook |
France has a decent rail network with high speed trains.
2.5 hr train journey in the UK would maybe get you from London to Birmingham. |  |
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| UK internal flights on 16:59 - Mar 12 with 1031 views | Swansea_Blue |
| UK internal flights on 09:48 - Mar 12 by NthQldITFC |
History will look back at this government as a hideous, out-of-touch, kleptomaniac, national reputation-destroying bunch of future-eating scum bags.
That will be their legacy. |
True, but I don’t think previous ones come out smelling of roses on this issue either. Airport expansions and the rise of cheap airlines have been going on for a while. I blame Freddie Laker!
There’s a bitter irony that our only decent HS line was essentially forced on us as a requirement to meet mainland Europe standards for the Eurostar.
As an aside rail travel on the continent is a delight relative to what we have to put up with. It’s surprising how easy it is to get around and it’s thoroughly reliable. We’ve given up flying and are currently planning a summer jaunt to the Alps on the train; sleepers make it a pretty time efficient way of getting around too - obviously not as quick as a flight, but far more enjoyable and quicker than driving (which often isn’t the case in the UK). The only downside is it’s a lot more expensive than budget flights. It’d be a crap way to do long haul to somewhere like the States or Australasia too! |  |
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| UK internal flights on 17:03 - Mar 12 with 1010 views | rosseden |
Most of the EU countries Covid bailouts were conditional on them closing their short haul networks where theres a rail alternative within a specific time window, so, makes a lot of sense to do this when you have good, well run publicly owned rail networks.
We have known this was coming and i expect to see it also spread to cross border journeys within the EU too where theres a suitable alternative. |  |
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| UK internal flights on 10:12 - Mar 13 with 683 views | Ely_Blue |
If trains were a more viable option then maybe people would want to take them, often the cost of a flight being so cheap and trains being so hideously expensive is it any wonder.
I feel very guilty this week for a travel choice I made but the train was the more difficult option.
I fly to Zürich tomorrow morning from Heathrow for 2 days of meetings and need to then be in a meeting on Thursday morning in Manchester at 9am.
My car will be at T5 in Heathrow so I either had to try and get a flight back on Wednesday night and drive to Manchester and then drive back from Manchester to Poole on Thursday night or do what I’ve done and taken a Zürich to Manchester flight on Thursday morning and then Manchester to Heathrow on Thursday night to be able to pick my car up and go home.
Sure I could probably have got a train but would then have had to get from Heathrow into London first and then back again, cost of the BA flight from Manchester to Heathrow on Thursday evening was £75, I didn’t even check train prices as I knew it would have been more |  |
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| UK internal flights on 11:06 - Mar 13 with 631 views | Leaky |
| UK internal flights on 15:02 - Mar 12 by StokieBlue |
Well, the PM certainly isn't worried about saving energy:
"Rishi Sunak’s new private heated swimming pool uses so much energy that the local electricity network had to be upgraded to meet its power demands, the Guardian has been told.
While many Britons are facing increased electricity bills — and are trying to limit their energy usage — extra equipment was recently installed in a remote part of North Yorkshire to provide extra capacity from the National Grid to the prime minister’s constituency home."
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/mar/12/rishi-sunak-has-electricity-gri
SB |
If you have air source heat pump or car charger you will probably need to your electric supply up graded. Usually upgrading from 60amp fuse to 100 amp fuse.
Sounds like Sunak's pool is heated by a Heat pump |  | | |
| UK internal flights on 11:24 - Mar 13 with 591 views | Radlett_blue |
| UK internal flights on 16:59 - Mar 12 by Swansea_Blue |
True, but I don’t think previous ones come out smelling of roses on this issue either. Airport expansions and the rise of cheap airlines have been going on for a while. I blame Freddie Laker!
There’s a bitter irony that our only decent HS line was essentially forced on us as a requirement to meet mainland Europe standards for the Eurostar.
As an aside rail travel on the continent is a delight relative to what we have to put up with. It’s surprising how easy it is to get around and it’s thoroughly reliable. We’ve given up flying and are currently planning a summer jaunt to the Alps on the train; sleepers make it a pretty time efficient way of getting around too - obviously not as quick as a flight, but far more enjoyable and quicker than driving (which often isn’t the case in the UK). The only downside is it’s a lot more expensive than budget flights. It’d be a crap way to do long haul to somewhere like the States or Australasia too! |
Yes, some of the early privatisations made sense - British Aeropsace, British Airways, British Steel etc, but provatising natiural monopolies like rail travel & energy distribution never made sense to me at the time. The real reason wasn't dogma but the fact that some of these porvatisations meant the state didn;t have to fund the necessary investment, so keeping the National Debt down, but I still think few of them made much sense. |  |
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| UK internal flights on 11:26 - Mar 13 with 584 views | Radlett_blue |
This seemed an inexplicable decision from a government which has been trying to promote itself as "green" with its net zero emission target by 2050. | |
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