Big changes are coming to London Heathrow, both in terms of the airport’s physical cargo infrastructure and the way in which the UK’s primary gateway will operate in future.
Heathrow Airport Ltd (HAL) head of cargo, James Golding told a seminar organized by the CCS UK User Group on 24 October that plans were being drawn up to redevelop the cargo area’s physical infrastructure, much of which dates back to the 1960s and which was designed before 40ft-long trucks were a common sight on the roads. The famous – or infamous – ‘Horseshoe Road’ area (Shoreham Road and Sandringham Road) will cease to be. The site will be cleared and a new Cargo West area will be developed. Plans for what will be put in this area have not yet been finalized, but it could consist of up to four major blocks, each with its own yard and gatehouse.
The large buildings currently occupied by IAG Cargo – the dominant carrier at Heathrow – will remain unchanged, but an adjacent area currently used for various purposes including a concrete plant will be redeveloped as a Cargo East area, possibly with a fifth large block.
Golding added: “Crucially, there will be no truck parking within this estate.” A remote parking area, possibly near the Terminal 4 passenger facility, will be provided, but the current truck spaces in the middle of Shoreham Road will disappear. Using some of the most expensive real estate in the world as a truck park area makes no commercial sense, HAL reasons.
This will have major implications for the way in which the airport will operate in future and, indeed, “we will need to have new systems in play before we start this redevelopment”, Golding stated.
The final form of the redeveloped cargo area has not yet been finalized, nor has the timescale, although a start could be made in 2-3 years with completion over 8-10 years. That is a long time by the standards of normal construction schemes of similar size, but Heathrow Cargo Centre will need to stay in full operation while the work is going on and the work will need to be phased.
More consultation will be needed before the plan is brought to fruition, said Golding, and ensuring that all the different entities are involved is an important part of the airport’s strategy. These include airlines, truckers, handling shed operators and freight forwarders.
Golding unveiled the plans for the new Cargo Centre at a seminar organized by the user group for CCS-UK, a cargo community system owned by telecoms firm BT. This might at first sight seem an unusual choice of venue for an announcement about physical infrastructure, but the IT systems offered by CCS-UK will be vital in making the new cargo development run smoothly. The fact that there will effectively be no onsite parking means that it is essential that the flow of trucks is managed efficiently.
Program director Guy Thompson explained that over the past few years, CCS-UK has been developing an Airfreight Information System (AIS) that will offer a uniform platform for the entire air cargo community in the UK.
AIS includes a new truck slot booking system that allows operators to pre-book the times when they want to arrive at handling facilities to collect or deliver cargo and are seen as crucial to the future smooth running of the airport. Other airports have already developed such schemes and they are also used by seaports and supermarket distribution centers. In airfreight, Amsterdam Schiphol has refined slot booking to a greater extent than any other European air gateway.
However, slot booking remains quite a new concept in airfreight and while the system is available and ready to use as part of AIS, it will doubtless need tweaking and many refinements before it is fully-fledged. CCS has signed up around 90 users and is encouraging others to do so. The fact that using the slot booking system will give users a degree of priority could be an incentive to encourage more users to join up. Trucks with pre-booked slots would get top priority, followed by those booking ad hoc slots at shorter notice. Trucks without slots get the lowest priority.
The system is currently processing some 3,000 truck movements a week and issuing 7,000 truck status updates.
However, even putting just 10% of collections and deliveries on the slot booking system could bring major benefits to users and transit shed operators, allowing them to plan operations rather than having to constantly work in a reactive way, dealing with all trucks turning up as they arrive unannounced.
One major prize for the system would be IAG Cargo, by far the biggest cargo airline at Heathrow and one that self-handles at the airport. Discussions on creating a specific interface are continuing. Royal Mail has been using the system on a trial basis and is now stepping up its use.
Slot booking is a complex issue, particularly in airfreight. The time taken to load or unload trucks can vary greatly. One issue raised at the seminar are trucks making multiple calls at different handling sheds. If the truck was delayed at the first shed, how would the system manage the slots at the second and subsequent sheds? Port Health inspections and charges collect shipments also add complications. The system also needs to be flexible to cope with last minute bookings such as urgent aircraft spares.
Golding is anxious to avoid a too-prescriptive approach. “We don’t want to mandate anything, to turn away business,” he said. It’s unlikely that truckers who missed an occasional slot would be ‘punished’ in any way – other than by then having then to wait for the next available slot, although the system will yield valuable information on how different operators perform and also where any bottlenecks are.
