Naturally, as is common with any built-up area on the edge of a large metropolitan zone, development pressures facing the Hillingdon planning authority include classic arguments about building on the green belt, combined with typical urban challenges such as densification of existing sites, change of use and pressure for residential accommodation.

A particular long-standing Hillingdon planning concern has always been what to do with Heathrow airport, which remains Europe's busiest international airport, despite having a far larger noise footprint than Paris Charles de Gaulle, Amsterdam Schiphol and Frankfurt International combined.

Yet despite pushes from Mayor of London Boris Johnson for a brand-new airport in the Thames estuary, a proposal that has re-emerged in various forms every decade or so since the war, a grandiose scheme of this nature is unlikely.

Whilst planners in Hillingdon will no doubt await the outcome of the Davis inquiry with interest, in particular with reference to whether it recommends an additional runway at Heathrow or elsewhere, the presence of Heathrow airport continues to present more rudimentary challenges for planning in Hillingdon in the more foreseeable future. These include planning enough homes to cater for Heathrow airport workers and other local demands, together with the immense pressures that an airport the size of Heathrow places on the local transport network.

Hillingdon has good access to the national motorway network via the M4 or the M25. In terms of local surface transport, the suburban nature of Hillingdon means that the majority of local journeys are undertaken by car, although the Great Western main line, which runs East to West through the borough, and to a lesser extent the Chiltern Main line, which calls that South Ruislip in the north-east of the borough, are useful for commuting in and out of Central London.

The London Borough of Hillingdon is served by three underground rail corridors, although they are all above surface through the borough, except for tunnels into Heathrow airport and underneath the town centre at Uxbridge.

A reasonable network of buses operates throughout the London Borough of Hillingdon, with a range of services operating via Heathrow airport, which naturally acts as a substantial transport magnet in the area.

Due to the longer commuting distances and the relatively poor state of local infrastructure, walking and cycling rates in Hillingdon are low by London standards. WEA Planning are Hillingdon planning consultants who can advise on a range of different planning issues in the borough.