Heathrow Terminal 4

A few years ago my work involved quite a lot of long-haul international travel. Anybody who has to do this sort of thing for a living will tell you that the glamour wears off rapidly after the first few long flights and and after the first few lonely nights in dreary corporate hotels. Nowadays I don’t fly so much - but I still know Heathrow like the back of my hand. So it always gives me great pleasure to visit the airport whenever I have to drop someone off or pick someone up. Terminal 4 is my favourite. There are a number of reasons why: the drive around the Northern and Southern Perimeter roads to get to the terminal from the Concorde roundabout is simply exhilerating. Trying not to be distracted by the planes coming in to land on the Northern runway - or by low-flying planes roaring overhead to land on the other runway. If I’m lucky I might get held up at the front of the traffic queue at the “plane crossing” near the British Airways plane hangars as a giant metal bird is pulled across the road from one hangar to another. Awesome.

On this bright Saturday morning … (continue reading by clicking the “MORE” below)

… I had reason to be at Heathrow Terminal 4. The terminal building itself is a fantastic case-study into visual communications, atmospherics and delightful surprises. I parked on the lowest deck of the short stay car park and wandered into the Arrivals hall. The first thing that hits you about Heathrow Airport is the consistency of the municipal-yellow-and-black signage from the moment you enter the terminal building. There is something “warm” and reassuring about that colour scheme - and the effect is somewhat accentuated when you have been out of the country for some time and arrive back at Heathrow.

A delightful surprise can be obtained by going up the escalators at the very far right of the Arrivals hall - the ones that lead you to Wetherspoon’s Bar. This is my favourite route to the Departures hall. When you get to the top of the escalator - it seems that the only place to go is the bar itself - but if you take a sharp left and follow the little passage you will come to another escalator which is going up. When you get to the top of this you hang left through an anonymous passage down the side of a Boots shop and you will suddenly be confronted by the bustling departures all. The effect is quite dramatic. There are hundreds of people - all crowding up in front of an endless row of what seems like hundreds of British Airways Check-in desks. There is a distinctly “international” feeling in the atmosphere. Even the airport staff and airline representatives - who look so ordinarily “London” when you might stand or sit next to them on the tubes or trains, or when you might pull up alongside them sat inside their cars at traffic lights on the streets - are transformed into members of an “international elite” when on duty in the airport. Like the architecture and the atmosphere - these people define the very essence of Heathrow.

Another thing that amazes me about Terminal 4 is the system of Tensa-Barrier “mazes” that sprawl in front of the Check-In desks. These are so unlike those that can be found at the other terminals - and is probably because there is a lot more space - and the mazes are a lot deeper. The incredible thing is that the airline representatives who “man” the mazes have a way of changing the configuration of the maze at a drop of a hat - in order to react to the relative density of the crowd wanting to check-in for a particular flight. Amazing!

There are times when I feel that I could spend all day at Heathrow Airport - there is so much to see. It’s so unlike any other airport in the world - and I have seen a fair few. It’s definitely the most interesting and varied - and despite being shabby and dated in some parts - it’s still one of the most welcome and reassuring things about arriving home after being out of the country for a while. And it’s not just me - I could see that on the faces of the people who had just arrived as I passed through the Arrivals hall on the way back to my car. I love Heathrow Airport.

Posted by jag at March 13, 2004 02:04 PM