Travelling by air a

There are four airports in London: Heathrow in the west, Gatwick in the south, Stansted in the north and the city airport in the City of London. Heathrow is the busiest international air­port in the world with more than 1000 planes taking off and landing every day. They carry over a hundred thousand people to and from 85 countries. Heathrow airport opened on the 1^st of January 1946.

If you are travelling into London, simply catch a FastTrain coach to Heathrow Junction outside your arrival terminal. You should look out for the posters and bus information boards. The FastTrain service uses brand new, purpose-built trains which fea­ture air-conditioning, ergonomically designed seating, generous luggage space, an on board information system and airline-style customer service. Tickets are available at the ticket offices at Paddington railway station, and at other outlets in London, in­cluding Rail, speedlink and selected Bureaux de Change. Tick­ets may also be purchased with sterling or credit/debit cards on board FastTrain. In June 1998, Heathrow Express launched with a dedicated non-stop, high-speed service linking London with the world’s leading airport every 15 minutes. In addition to the full range of facilities and services already offered on FastTrain, the new service which provided an exclusive First Class option with wider seats and tables. Since 1998 there is no faster way to travel between central London and Heathrow.

Within Britain there is a good network of domestic air routes. Scheduled flights connect major cities and islands. British Air­ways and British Midland operate shuttle flights between Lon­don and Edinburgh, Glasgow, Manchester and Belfast. Passen­gers on these flights need check in only ten minutes before departure.

A wide range of discount fares is available — travel agents have details. For example, most airlines offer standby fares, usu­ally restricted to “off-peak” flights on weekdays and on flights at weekends.

The “Europe Airpass” is for travel on British Airways, Deut- sch BA and Air UK direct flights within Europe (including the Channel Islands). It can be purchased from BA travel offices and their agents, but only in conjunction with scheduled intercontinen­talflights into Britain and at least seven days prior to arrival. The ticket is not available in Europe, Cyprus, Israel, Russia, Tur­key, Tunisia, and Morocco. Individual sectors in Europe may not be travelled more than once in each direction, and reserva­tions must be made when the ticket is issued. Just have your travel agent issue a ticket for your complete UK routing and book the first sector before arrival in Europe.

Comprehension questions:

1. How many airports are there in London?

2. What is the busiest international airport in the world? Prove it.

3 . What kind of trains does the Fast Train service use?

4. Where are tickets available?

5. What does the new service provide?

6. How much time before departure do passengers check in on domestic flights?

7. Are any discount fares available?

8. Where can the “Europe Airpass” be purchased?

9. How many times in each direction may individual sec­tors in Europe be travelled?

B

Domestic flights in the USA are organized on the principle of hubs and spokes, like a bicycle wheel which has a hub at the centre and lots of spokes radiating out from it in all directions. One such hub is Houston in Texas: flights to over 100 other air­ports radiate out in different directions from there and half of these are non-stop flights.

For example, if you want to get from Miami to Los Angeles, you can catch a Continental Airlines flight from Fort Lauder­dale, change planes in Houston and fly on to Orange County.

The hub and spokes network has made flights cheaper and means that even quite small places are connected to each other by a major airline or feeder service. Another advantage of the system is that connecting flights are to some extent guaranteed. If one incoming flight is up to one hour late, all the connecting flights (up to 30 or 40) will be held until it arrives. So if you are on a delayed flight, that’s good news-but it’s bad news for ev­eryone else because they all have to wait for your plane to land.

From the point of view of overseas connections, many hubs also operate as entry points or ‘gateways’, where passengers fly­ing in from another country can join the hub and spoke system. The same type of system does operate in other parts of the world: for example, you can fly from one part of Europe to another via Frankfurt or Paris or Amsterdam or London, but the difference in other parts of the world is that the fares are not any cheaper so there’s no special advantage.

Comprehension questions:

1. What principle are domestic flights in the USA organized on?

2. What proves that Houston in Texas is one such hub?

3. What should you do if you want to get from Miami to Los Angeles?

4. What does the hub and spokes network mean?

5. What is another advantage of the system?

6. Where does the same type of system operate?

TEXT WORK ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■

1. Find the following numbers in the texts. What do they refer to? Make a sentence about each number.

100; 1998; 15; 1000; 30 or 40; 85; 1946.

2. Answer the questions about'airports and flights in the UK and the USA.

1. When was it opened?

2. How many people do they carry over?

3. Where are they available?

4. When was it launched with a dedicated non-stop, high­speed service?

5. What do they connect?

6. Are they available?

7. What do they offer?

8. What is it for?

9. Should you book it before arrival in Europe?

10. On what principle are they organized?

11. Has it made flights cheaper?

12. What is another advantage of it?

13. Does it operate in other parts of the world?

3. Using the information given in the text, complete each of the following sentences.

Model: If you want to get from St. Petersburg to Los Ange­les, you can fly... — If you want to get from St. Petersburg to Los Angeles, you can fly Continental airlines and change planes at Houston, Texas.

1. If you want to avoid flying into LAX (Los Angeles Inter­national), you should...

2. If your flight is less than an hour late, your connecting flight will ...

3. If you fly between London and Vienna via Frankfurt or Paris, instead of direct, the fare...

4. If you are entering the United States from abroad, you should...

4. At an international airport you are sure to see the signs and notices given below. Study and then ask your fel- low-students to explain their meaning.

At the Airport

To the Customs Check in

Passport Control Deposits

Immigration Baggage reclaim

Departure Lounge Duty Free Withdrawals Gate 2 Security

Arrivals concourse

Here are six announcements made over the public address sys­tem of an airport.

As you read, identify the type of message.

• staff announcement — warning

• advertisement — paging a passenger

• flight cancellation — delayed flight departure

• delayed flight arrival — security announcement

• final flight call

Announcement 1

Passengers are reminded that smoking is not permitted in any part of the terminal building.

Announcement 2

Will passenger Eckber from Miami please go to Airport In­formation where your tour leader is waiting. Passenger Eckber to Airport Information.

Announcement 3

This is a staff call. Will Roger Broom please go to the Bag­gage Hall immediately. Roger Broom to the Baggage Hall.

Announcement 4

This is the final call flight IB763 to Madrid. Will any remain­ing passengers please proceed immediately to gate number 14 where the aircraft is about to depart.

Announcement 5

British Airways regret to announce the delay of flight BA008 to New York. Passengers should report with their boarding cards to the BA desk where vouchers for refreshments will be given. We would like to apologize for any inconvenience.

Announcement 6

This is a security announcement. Passengers are reminded not to leave baggage unattended at any time. Any unattended baggage will be removed and may be destroyed.

In five of the announcements, specific areas or parts of the airport are mentioned. Note down these places.

5. Look at this diagram indicating basic airport procedure

and layout.

What happens at each point?

What other facilities and services do you find in an airport?