Britain 'falling out of love' with air travel

A range of problems that air travel has come up against in recent months has been looked at in detail, resulting in many people falling out of love with the mode of transport.

The Independent on Sunday stated that a combination of poor airport experience, the tough economic outlook and a number of airline failures has contributed to a fall from grace for the transport medium.

It stated that 18 leading airports in the UK had experienced traffic falls of 4.5 per cent, dropping from 20.8 million customers to 19.9 million in one month, something the newspaper attributed to the recent troubles with XL.

"The collapse of XL Leisure, the UK's third largest holiday company, on 12th September - which left 85,000 holidaymakers stranded abroad - created embarrassing publicity for the industry and left customers worried about what would happen if their airline went bust."

It was revealed today that British Airways has been accused of exploiting a legal loophole to avoid compensation pay-outs, according to Channel 4's Dispatches.