Happy landings

HaVING commuted twice-weekly in and out of Scotland over six years, I became i ntimately f amiliar with Glasgow, Edinburgh and Prestwick airports.

Prestwick certainly felt l i ke an unloved NHS hospital from the late Sixties – lots of peeling paint and worn vinyl flooring. But it knew what it was about: Shifting passengers effectively and efficiently.

By contrast, Glasgow and Edinburgh both felt like they were far more interested in selling you bottles of whisky, fancy afters have and tartan gonks than in getting you smoothly on and off your flight. Giant superqueues through security were more about funneling you into their shopping areas than getting flights off on time.

In part, Prestwick’s efficiency might be explained by its lower volume of flights, but it seemed to have a clear purpose. a lot of that was down to Ryanair’s large presence.

Many slate the Irish carrier, but it fairly hustles along, crisply marshalling people on and off its Boeings. It seems to me to manipulate its arrival time figures by stating a longer than necessary flight time, which then facilitates its annoying on-time arrival announcement – complete with trumpet solo.

But I’d take that over the ‘...would like to apologise’ lateness announcements so intrinsic to other airlines, including so- called flag carrier and ‘legacy’ airlines.

Shamefully, neither Glasgow nor Edinburgh has rail links – which Prestwick does enjoy and which makes i t possible to l eave the terminal and get to the rail station without stepping into the rain.

So what now for Prestwick under Scottish Government control? Hopefully there will no return of the witless ‘pure dead brilliant’ branding. Hopefully, too, the shabby con of calling it Glasgow (Prestwick) airport will end. Nothing annoys foreign tourists more than the shock of finding they have landed a good hour away from Glasgow. credit them with some sense and be honest about the airport’s location – how about West of Scotland (Prestwick) airport?

Happy landings to an asset any other country in the world would long ago have made much more of than we Scots have done.

PETE MITCHELL, North Ayrshire.