IT was as far back as December 2013, that you published a letter headed "Airport dinosaur." Since then every year has produced correspondence with headlines such as "Report on viability of Prestwick to be kept confidential" or "Airport flight of fancy is never going to take off."
It seems at long last the Government has had to bite the bullet and acknowledge that despite an investment of more than £40 million it is not possible for it to be commercially viable ("Airport is put up for sale as fears rise over £40m hit to public purse", The Herald, June 14). Indeed, a further tranche of £20m appears to be necessary to upgrade its facilities to promote interest and eventually a possible sale.
So much for its long fog-free runway and only recently the possibility of its nearness to Glasgow suggesting it only needed one more advertising push to secure traffic and its financial future. Even when or if the facilities are upgraded, who would wish to take a commercial decision bearing in mind its history? If that is the case what happens then?
No one can be pleased by this decision. That it has taken so long for the Transport Secretary to understand the economics of the situation is shameful. No doubt it was the fact that the SNP was reluctant, politically speaking, to be seen to be selling off the family silver, not realising that it was tarnished from the onset. There will be a coterie of engineering companies round the airport which will be affected. I have no doubt that their skills and expertise will allow them to survive. If only the Government had had the political will to take the necessary hard, unpopular decision at the time to reject it when it was offered for sale at £1, then Prestwick town might well have been able to get a makeover that would attract further inward investment.
It is easy to image that there will be a similar fudging over the ongoing dispute over the delay in the building of the ferries. It would not be surprising if that bill exceeded the one at the end of the M77.
Robin Johnston, Newton Mearns.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel