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A Brief History on Heathrow Airport |
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Not only did you get a boarding card at this particular tent you could also order a pre-flight drink at the bar. This was Heathrow, one of the busiest airports in 1946. The evidence is on the wall. Passengers using the sophisticated facilities of today's Terminal 4 will find photographs and murals of the way we were 50, years ago. Heathrow's only terminal then was an army surplus tent situated a short walk from the aircraft. It is staggering to think that the airport, which is now almost a self-contained city with a population of 60,000 workers, started life as a small grass airfield. The Great Western Aerodrome was privately owned by the Fairey company and used largely for test flying. London's commercial flights took off from nearby Heston and Hanworth Park airfields. Wartime priorities changed the course of Heathrow's history. In 1944 it was requisitioned by the Air Ministry to be developed as a major transport base for the Royal Air Force. Before the work was completed the war ended and with it came the prospect of a huge expansion in civil aviation. London needed a large airport with modern equipment and the partly-built site at Heathrow was ideal. One runway was ready for use and when the Ministry of Civil Aviation took it over in 1946 the tented terminal was quickly put in place and a new chapter began. By the following year three runways had been completed and work on another three - subsequently abandoned as unnecessary - was going on. The days of the tent were numbered and a new, permanent building arose in the central area at the start of the 1950s. As traffic boomed the airport found itself with an ever-increasing demand for passenger facilities. The Queen inaugurated a new building in 1955 which is today's Terminal 2 and the tunnel which provides the main road access to Heathrow's central area was opened. With hindsight that has proved to be a flawed concept as it struggles to cope with the burden of today's flow of airport traffic. Next came the new Oceanic terminal handling long-haul carriers, a function it still performs as Terminal 3, followed by the opening of Terminal 1 in 1968. Increased congestion in the central area led to the birth of Terminal 4 in 1986 on the south side of the airport, a modern facility but an inconvenient 10-20 minute transfer from the heart of Heathrow. The pressures on London's principal airport keep mounting. The extension of the city rail link to the airport central area is now open and Heathrow has received approval to build another passenger terminal. Today's improvements are tomorrow's history at the grass airfield which became a world name |
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