These are exciting times in the air industry….well, okay perhaps ‘exciting’ is not quite the right word, but certainly these are ‘interesting’ times. Sometimes sitting down to write this column

I’m confronted by the blankness of not only the screen, but a dearth of interesting things to write about. This time, however, it’s the exact opposite.

The Italian saga of Alitalia will undoubtably make a great book one day, but personally I’ll wait for the movie…maybe Sophia Loren will star, after all, that’s about the era Alitalia’s unions seem to be stuck in. But be forewarned, your next flight may forsake the standard aerobridge in favour of a scooter trip across the apron.

And then of course there is the global economic situation that seems likely to get much, much worse before it gets better. The usually unflappable Warren Buffet spoke with almost amusing hyperbole barely a week ago when he described the current US-led crisis as an “economic Pearl Harbour”. We didn’t realise the US economy was under ‘foreign’ attack.

But best of all, there are two unique characters – both from the UK – and both, by a twist of absurd fate, have been thrown together. On one hand there is London Heathrow and on the other there is the irrepressible mayor of London, Boris Johnson.

The first, Heathrow, is really more about BAA – owned by Spain’s Ferrovial since 2006 – and the pressure it’s facing from the UK competition watchdog because of its dominant ownership of UK airports, including the top three: Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted.

Does it really matter if ownership in a capital intensive business like running an airport is concentrated? Surely not if they are well run and kept in check by regulators. But this is perhaps part of the problem. It’s not easy to fi nd fans of Heathrow. Even less so after the debacle of Terminal 5, which still is not fully resolved.

Although its Europe’s third largest air freight gateway with nearly 1.5 million tonnes of cargo handled annually, it suffers serious congestion, does not operate 24 hours and nearly always gives preference to the passenger side of the business. And while a well-thought out plan for a third runway makes perfect sense, let’s face it, citizens and environmental groups will ensure it never sees the light of day. Enter Boris, stage left.

What the clever, but clearly slovenly mayor of the great London metropolis has dreamed up, is nothing short of clear brilliance. Tear down the Babylon of the UK airport world and start from scratch.

Let’s face it, as a passenger, Heathrow is a nightmare. As a piece of cargo things are substantially better, but far from perfect. And hemmed in on all sides by an ever increasingly vociferous population, any further expansion is going to be one very hard sell.

The answer according to ye olde mayor, is a 24 hour airport on an artificial island in the Thames estuary off the Isle of Sheppey in Kent. Th e idea, while not wholly original as it appears to borrow much from the master plan that created Hong Kong’s newish airport, does make a lot of sense.

“You can’t endlessly expand Heathrow in the suburbs of west London and entrench what was really a planning error of decades ago,” Boris said wisely.

“What we are looking at is a way of solving this great capital’s aviation needs without endlessly expanding our number one international airport,” he added.

Th is could well be just what the cargo sector has itself been dreaming about. Imagine the possibilities of a new-era Heathrow built from the ground up.

But this could well remain in dreamland, as already environmentalists are lining up to take shots at the idea. But if we know Boris, he’s already got something else uphis sleeve, and we can hardly wait to see what’s next.