EuroFlyer wrote:
So it is entirely up to the UK, correct ? What am I missing ?
You are missing nothing. Its just UK goverment (likely) decided that the Safety-of-Life is not worth the money…
I very much doubt that. If it wasn’t a huge amount they would just pay it.
It either was a huge amount (many millions, net after allowing for the UK hosting the monitoring stations) or Brussels flatly refused to talk about it as a part of the “apply max pressure” package.
LPV is not a big thing in the UK. Alderney has got LPV but with a population of 1800 it isn’t a big factor, and the commercial planes can scud run at 500ft over the sea. There are numerous airports in the UK which have full ATC and have IAPs based on navaids, which are generally flown using a GPS anyway, and the only benefit there of LPV would be lower minima. For example the Shoreham draft LPV, which I test flew some years ago to see if it is too steep (of course it isn’t; even a CJ4 had no issue) had a DH of some 550ft versus 800ft for the normal RNAV. That one would have been nice to have. And the bizjet places have ILS – Biggin, Luton, Lydd, Farnborough, etc. And non-ATC IAPs are almost useless – Sywell 6 a day complete joke or Lands End LPV with slots.
If the UK decides to go back to the stone age and remove LPV, then I suppose they can buy quite a few removed ILS ground eqippment from those who throw it out these days.
The future is clearly LPV, which allows installing instrument approaches almost everywhere and which also will replace ILS more and more. For the UK this means, those possibilities are lost to them and even existing LPV approaches will have to be removed.
Obviously we do not know what the EU wanted in return, it may well be part of their economic cold war against the UK to withhold such technology or outprice it in order to show once more what it means to be a third country.
I wonder when they might go back to analogue navigation totally in order not to be dependent on GPS as well… ILS, VOR and NDB approaches like in the old days and those who can’t do those anymore shall stay out.
On the other hand: Doesn’t the US have LPV approaches as well, using their GPS and WAAS system? So maybe the UK want to orient themselves there and get the equipment from the US instead. Or am I missing something here?
This is interesting as it seems NATS are involved in terms of operating, so they may have chosen not to operate something that is owned by the Eu citizens any longer
Peter wrote:
It either was a huge amount (many millions, net after allowing for the UK hosting the monitoring stations) or Brussels flatly refused to talk about it as a part of the “apply max pressure” package.
Or the ESSP wanted any disputes to be decided by the ECJ…
Of course, but that is (or was made a condition, by Brussels) equivalent to not leaving the EU, which the UK was doing.
I remain curious as to what really happened here. I suspect NATS decided that the usefulness of the few LPV approaches is not worth their money. They have always been totally money-oriented. When I visited them ~2010 regarding the AFPEX flight plan filing tool, and suggested they should copy all Inbox AFTN messages to a preconfigured email address (a great feature, for CTOTs etc), I was told they cannot write a single line of code without a financial justification. And 99% of GA doesn’t pay route charges… The only thing NATS spend money on, and lots of it, is potted plants around their plush offices at Swanwick 
Mooney_Driver wrote:
On the other hand: Doesn’t the US have LPV approaches as well, using their GPS and WAAS system?
The European LPV approaches also use Navstar (the US GPS system). However, when it comes to WAAS, the geostationary satellite for the USA is in the wrong place for the UK.
Peter wrote:
That tends to suggest that a non EU airport is able to do a direct deal with EGNOS for the authorisation to receive the electrons
Not necessarily. The deal may have been done by the Norwegian state, or with its support.
and Norway is EASA member as well as under ECJ jurisdiction.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
On the other hand: Doesn’t the US have LPV approaches as well, using their GPS and WAAS system? So maybe the UK want to orient themselves there and get the equipment from the US instead. Or am I missing something here?
WAAS doesn’t cover the UK’s territory. Japan has its own SBAS system; its territory size and GDP are in the same order of magnitude of the UK’s, so it is not inconceivable out of hand for the UK to launch its own SBAS system, too. (Whether that would be an efficient use of public funds, rather than participating in EGNOS, is another question altogether.)
