BAA's spin aside, no amount of sugar coating will make the sale less bitter for them. This specific deal may have been driven partly by debt-related considerations but it takes place against a much more contentious background: BAA's ongoing battle with the Competition Commission. In March the Commission instructed the company to sell Gatwick, Stansted, and either Edinburgh or Glasgow. For folk's counting along at home, that's three out of BAA's six airports.
A lot of aviation industry watchers rolled their eyes at the ruling. You don't have to be a die-hard libertarian to know that now is hardly the time to dismantle airline-related economies of scale. It's one thing to have to operate airports at a temporary loss. But being forced to sell them at a permanent loss—the sales, among other things, are pegged to current and near-term performance—is basically a massive fine. If BAA was considering selling Glasgow next, for instance, they'd need an answer as to why they're considering shutting down Glasgow's Terminal 2 for the winter because of low traffic. Odds of that working out well: not great.
[Photo: LGW Skybridge / Wiki Commons]
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