According to the Department of Transport, this new plan is going to cost about £5 billion. They also want everyone to note that the plan has not been officially decided on. In fact, it is just under consideration at this point.

Recently, a number of airlines in the UK have announced their disappointment with this proposed link. However, very few airlines have been as vocal about it as Ryanair. This is because the boss of Ryanair, Michael O’Leary, has come out and told the world just what he thinks about this new link.

Mr. O’Leary, who is the chief executive of Ryanair, said that the government has no policy on aviation whatsoever. They do not have a particular expertise in tunneling either. In fact, the last tunnel that they did, the Eurotunnel, went bankrupt before it was even open.

Of course, O’Leary did not stop there. He went on to tell the government what it really needs to do. He said this money should really go to building three additional runways. The three should be split up between Gatwick, Stansted, and Heathrow. This could be done for as little as £150 million to £200 million in each of the three airports. In the end, it would cost less than making this tunnel.

This airline, which is Mexico’s national airline, had earlier assured its passengers that it would continue to operate its services from London. This route, which first started back in October of 2008, is one of the 18 routes that is going to be suspended over the next few days as the airline undergoes a financial restricting program.

The airline itself has suffered from a dramatic fall in the number of holidaymakers visiting Mexico. This has been caused by a lot of things. However, the two biggest factors that have stopped people from traveling to Mexico have been the economic downturn and, of course, the swine flu outbreak. Thus, the airline’s debts exceed £628 million.

In a statement on the airline’s website, the company said that the financial situation is no longer sustainable after the union failed to agree with its cost saving measures. Despite the new investment and savings of some £500 million, the airline’s operating costs are still too high. The airline added that its pilots earn up to 50 percent more than the average wage paid by airlines in the United States, and its flight attendants earn up to 32 percent more than the United States average.

The airline went on to propose a cut in pay of up to 41 percent. They also would like to ax some 700 jobs to get costs down.

Of course, environmental campaigners are reacting very warmly to this news. Ben Stewart from Greenpeace said that this is fantastic news that was met with great relief. A third runway at Heathrow was always a bizarre proposal that made no sense to anybody who understood the impact aviation has on the climate.

On the other side, the aviation industry was a little more than upset about the announcement. A spokesperson for British Airways simply said that the incoming government is well aware of the airline’s view, and they have taken a different position on the matter. The airline said that they are content for the matter to rest there.

The scrapping of the third Heathrow runway was an expected move by the new administration. However, the blocking of more landing strips at Gatwick and Stansted was not. This could actually potentially reduce the value of both of these airports.

Also, the incoming government will be scrapping the air passenger duty tax with a tax on the planes, not the passengers. This means that full flights will be cheaper than flights that are poorly used. British Airways was not very enthusiastic about this move. They said that the existing APD is not used to fund environmental or infrastructure benefits. There is no guarantee that a flight based tax would.

Sir David Rowlands met with members of the Gatwick Area Conservation Campaign to talk about future plans for the airport under its new owner, the United States-based investment fund Global Infrastructure Partners. Following the sale in December, the Gatwick Area Conservation Campaign and other groups feared that the new owners would purse plans to build a second runway despite the airport having an agreement with West Sussex Country Council not to consider any plans before 2019.

Sir Rowlands went on to say that the simple fact is that his team at Gatwick have not a shred of interest in a second runaway. It’s not government policy, and it’s not in their policy. He said that even if the government started to look more favorably at the prospect, they would have to think very hard about spending £100 million to £200 million on a planning application with an uncertain decision.

The chairman of the Gatwick Area Conservation Campaign, Brendon Sewill, said that these comments should help to kill off speculation and a lot of uncertainty and anxiety. He said that Gatwick Area Conservation campaign thanks all of those who, over the years, have supported the campaign against a new runway. The united stand by local people, local MPs and all the local councils across Surrey, Sussex and Kent has helped produce this result. He said that they will remain on guard and stand ready in case other threats come up.

Just last year, South Korea’s National Pension Service bought the headquarters of HSBC in Canary Wharf for £773 million in cash. The group says it aims to expand its overall portfolio from $240 million to $400 billion by 2014.

The South Korea National Pension Service chairman, Jun Kwang-Woo, said that the fund is hoping to raise its investment in Britain. Right now Britain only makes up 1.3 percent of its portfolio. He went on to say that some infrastructure-related investment ahead of the London Olympics in 2012 could be very interesting and could generate some momentum. The regulatory framework is very stable and reliable.

Gatwick Airport is Europe’s eighth busiest airport measured by traffic. The airport itself handled 34 million passengers in 2008. The airport was bough last November by Global Infrastructure Partners, as the infrastructure fund was backed by Credit Suisse and General Electric, for £1.51 billion. Bank financing supplied 45 percent of the purchase price.

Mr Jun went on to say that their investment strategy for now and for the foreseeable future is to look for possibilities to join forces with big international players. This could lead to big things for South Korea National Pension Service. On that same note, the interest in Gatwick Airport shows that the UK property continues to be attractive to international groups.

This new move will become effective from the end of March. The three aircrafts that remain at the airport will be serving Malaga, Dublin and Knock, and a new route to Cork. On top of these cuts, it seems that the company will also be deferring the delivery of two A320 aircrafts, originally due for delivery in October and November of this year to April and May of next year.

Savage pay cuts, a round of redundancies, and a large capacity cut means that the Irish flag carrier might be able to post a small profit for this year. A statement from the company said that, as a result of the cost and capacity management actions that were implemented in 2009, the group may be able to report a small operating profit for the second half of 2009.

Aer Lingus went on to say that this performance primarily reflects better than expected yields in the second half of 2009. This has been derived by the removal of a long haul aircraft in September and tactical route cancellations in November. Passenger figures were also up in December of last year by 9 percent when compared year on year.

Airports including Gatwick, Bristol, Exeter and Blackpool were all closed as snow was cleared from the runways.

Other airports such as Heathrow, Birmingham, Luton and Southampton remained open but experienced long delays and many cancellations.

Stansted Airport claimed that flights would continue as normal but suggested that passengers should get at the airport early.

All other major airports across the UK remained open, despite experiencing delays and cancellations due to the adverse weather conditions which rocked the UK last night.

Management of Gatwick airport said they were working closely with airlines and business partners to re-open the runway as soon as it was safe to do so.

They advised passengers travelling form the airport in the next 24 hours to check their airline for the lastest flight information.

They continued by saying that they regret the disruption caused to passengers’ travel plans, but the safety and security of aircraft and passengers was the number one priority.

Easyjet cancelled over 70 services from airports such as Gatwick, Belfast, Bristol, Newcastle, Liverpool and Luton, while Southampton reopened after closing on Tuesday evening as weather conditions deteriorated in Hampshire.

Blackpool International and Exeter International Airport have also suspended flights.

Those seeking car rentals may also be advised that the big chill has managed to disrupt rail and roads across the country, especially in the South East, where the heaviest snow has fallen.

Train operators are running adjusted timetables as they struggle to deal with the freezing conditions.

These include East Coast, East Midlands, Chiltern Railways, First Great Western, National Express East Anglia, South West Trains, Southeastern, Southern and First Capital Connect.

The Future of Aviation is set to argue that British airports, particularly Heathrow, must be better connected to maintain the UK as a key European travel hub. This is a title that the UK is set to lose due to the rise in the air passenger duty tax. After all, the best way for people to avoid this tax is just to avoid flying into the UK in the first place.

The report goes on to talk about the states that are economic benefits to a third runway at Heathrow, as long as there is better access to the airport and it is subject to tough environmental restrictions. Of course, the report does reject the proposed second runway at Stansted. They state that the economic advantages are still very unclear. Instead, the committee recommends that Gatwick would be a better airport to expand.

The chairman of the committee, Louise Ellman, said that aviation is a very important part of the UK economy. He points out that Heathrow is a major European hub, but only six UK cities have flights into it. This is something that needs to be improved. For example, the direct access to Heathrow from the National Rail network would help to maximize economic benefits and reduce environmental impacts.

Reports suggest that Global Infrastructure will be buying Gatwick Airport for almost £1.5 billion. This is a deal that is expected to be closed as soon as the end of this week. Right now the deal is just subject to European Commission approval.

Global Infrastructure Partners says that they will be deploying a team to the airport to fix and overhaul the operations. The plans do include a new lounge to cope with the airport’s growing business traffic. However, the plans also deal with an expansion in the security area, as well as remodeling the check in hall.

One of the major problems at present is that each of the airlines have fixed check in desks at Gatwick Airport. This means that a lot of check in desks go unused when an airline has no flights leaving. Global Infrastructure Partners says that if airlines shared facilities, then the airport would be able to better cope with peak periods, thus, easing the traffic flow through the check in hall.

Michael McGhee, a member of Global Infrastructure Partners, said that these kinds of things will take time, however. In fact, he thinks that passengers may not even really start noticing a difference until almost 18 months later. However, customers should remain happy knowing that things are in the works.

However, the passengers that normally might have used the rial service to London, can now enjoy massive fare savings if they are willing to take advantage of easyBus’ lowest online fare of 2 pounds. This is a savings of almost 15 pounds when compared to rail fares.

Gatwick is currently quoting the connection time as being 20 minutes for the replacement bus service to the South Terminal. Thus, there is no real time disadvantage to passengers who opt to take the easyBus instead of the express rail. The journeys to London will take less than an hour.

The brand new inter terminal transit system, which is being installed at Gatwick Airport, is part of the airport’s 1 billion pound investment program. However, while this overhaul is taking place from September 28, 2009 till May 2010, the replacement bus service will have to operate between Gatwick’s North and South Terminals. Right now the service is said to run every three minutes during the day and every six minuets during the night.

The goal for easyBus and Gatwick Airport is to make sure that this overhaul does not affect the passengers. They aim to make sure that passengers do not experience delays due to using the bus service.