The airports operator BAA will today unveil a pounds 4bn upgrade of Heathrow's central terminal area designed to give rival airlines the same quality of service that British Airways will enjoy when it moves into the new Terminal 5 in 2008.
The move comes after intensive pressure on BAA from carriers such as Virgin Atlantic and bmi, who have complained that BA will have an unfair advantage unless other carriers are provided with improved facilities.
About half the pounds 4bn to be spent over the next 10 years will be on the upkeep of existing facilities but the remaining pounds 2bn will be on new piers, aprons and check-in facilities in Terminals 1, 2, 3 and 4.
Among the enhancements which BAA has already announced are new piers for Terminals 1 and 3 to enable them to accommodate the 550-seat Airbus A380 super-jumbo and new check-in facilities for Terminal 3.
Terminal 5, which is being built at a cost of pounds 4.2bn on a former sludge works to the west of the airport, is already 68 per cent complete. BA has decided to switch to the new terminal from its existing Terminals 1 and 4 in a single move in 2008. BA's new chief executive Willie Walsh has described it as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to raise efficiency levels by abandoning antiquated working practices, some of which date back to the 1970s.
Once BA's move is complete, the Star Alliance of airlines, led by Lufthansa, United and bmi, will move into Terminals 1 and 2 while Terminal 4 will become the home of the Skyteam alliance led by Air France and KLM. Terminal 3 will house a number of BA's partners in the Oneworld alliance such as Iberia, American Airlines and Aer Lingus and 'non-aligned' carriers such as Virgin.
One airline executive said: 'The penny has dropped at last with BAA that it cannot spend pounds 4.2bn on BA and treat everyone else as second-class citizens. We can expect to see significant improvements in the central terminal area beyond what BAA was init- ially planning when Terminal 5 opens.'
BAA's 10-year investment programme from 2005 to 2015 envisages total expenditure on its regulated airports of pounds 6.9bn, not including the second runway at Stansted airport.
Of that total amount, some pounds 5.6bn is due to be spent at Heathrow. BAA will spend pounds 1.24bn this year alone, the bulk of it on Terminal 5, which has already soaked up pounds 2.9bn.
