Heathrow 2014 passenger figures edge up, hopeful on runway

By Sarah Young LONDON (Reuters) - The operator of London's Heathrow Airport is hopeful plans to build a new runway could receive long-awaited backing from a government-appointed commission this year, helping bolster traffic at Britain's busiest airport. Heathrow reported a 1.4 percent increase in 2014 passengers on Monday helped by bigger, fuller airplanes. There is little room for additional flights, as the airport is essentially full, operating at 98 percent of its capacity. Future growth would be about 0.5 percent a year, Heathrow Chief Executive John Holland-Kaye said in an interview on Monday. Expansion of Heathrow has long been a political issue. Britain's Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition which won the 2010 election scrapped the previous Labour government's plans to build a new runway at Heathrow, west of London. Now a government-appointed commission is weighing three options - two different plans to build a new runway at Heathrow, or to expand Gatwick Airport, south of the capital. It is set to make a recommendation after the next election in May. Holland-Kaye said he was confident of progress on airport expansion, an issue which has been around since the 1970s, as the political climate had shifted both nationally and locally. "I think we've got a good chance. If you speak to the two largest parties, they both say the same thing, that this is an issue of national importance, it's urgent," he said. In residential areas close to the airport, the issue had also fallen off the agenda somewhat, Holland-Kaye said, with the latest expansion proposal positioning the runway to minimise noise and offering more compensation. "We never had anything close to that on the table five years ago. We now have a good plan because we've listened to local communities," he said. The airport, whose biggest shareholder is Spanish firm Ferrovial, reported a 10.3 percent rise in 2014 core earnings (EBITDA) to 1.57 billion pounds. (Reporting by Sarah Young; editing by Paul Sandle and Jason Neely)