April 4, 2008
Open Skies Agreement / Heathrow Terminal 5 Problems
Flying between the US and Europe should be easier (and cheaper) this summer, with the announcement of the so-called open skies agreement, which came into effect at the end of March. The agreement means that more airlines are allowed to fly between the US and Europe; and that airlines don’t necessarily have to originate in their own country – for example, British Airways can fly from Paris to New York.
Several airlines have already taken advantage of this agreement and are announcing new routes from the US into London Heathrow – Air France, Northwest, Delta and US Airways. And American Airlines is switching almost all of its London flights from Gatwick to Heathrow, in an effort to improve onward connections to Europe, Asia and Africa.
Ryanair which offers one way fares from the UK to Europe for around $20 one way, also has plans to fly to the US, with fares as low as about $16 one way, although I couldn’t see anything about that on their website.
If you are flying to Heathrow you may find yourself arriving at the newly opened Terminal 5, which has been having all sorts of problems since the Queen opened it recently at a cost of around $8 billion.
The state of the art baggage handling system has not been working properly, leading to a backlog of almost 28,000 delayed bags at one point last weekend. And British Airways, which have exclusive use of the terminal, also canceled over 200 flights during the first few days of the terminal opening.
And don’t take the overpriced Heathrow Express train from the airport into London. It’s much less expensive to take the Underground, or tube as it’s called.
Guest entry by Mancunian
Posted by James Trotta at April 4, 2008 12:51 PM | TrackBack
The Tube trains from Heathrow to Central London are much less expensive than the Heathrow Express and the Tube trains can be conveniently reached from the airport terminal.
However, if you have a large luggage bags, it is much more of a hassle to carry these on the Tube trains in contrast to the Heathrow Express. Also, depending upon the Tube stop you need to reach in London, the Tube train can take much longer, say as much as 20 min. longer than the Heathrow Express, because of all the local stops made by the Tube Train. The Heathrow Express is non-stop and takes 15 minutes to reach Central London.
Posted by: Expat at April 5, 2008 3:50 PM