Editing British Isles (section)

==Transport==
{{See also|Transport in Ireland|Transport in the United Kingdom}}

[[London Heathrow Airport]] is Europe's busiest airport in terms of passenger traffic, and the Dublin-London route is the busiest air route in Europe collectively,<ref>{{Cite web |last=McCárthaigh |first=Seán |date=31 March 2003 |title=London busiest air traffic route within EU |url=http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/2003/03/31/story437213650.asp |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101206210538/http://archives.tcm.ie/irishexaminer/2003/03/31/story437213650.asp |archive-date=6 December 2010 |access-date= |website=[[Irish Examiner]]}}</ref> the busiest route out of Heathrow, and among the top-20 [[List of busiest passenger flight routes|busiest international air routes in the world]]. The [[English Channel]] and the southern [[North Sea]] are the busiest seaways in the world.<ref>{{Citation |first=Jack |last=Hardisty |title=The British Seas: an Introduction to the Oceanography and Resources of the North-west European Continental Shelf |publisher=Routledge |location=London |year=1990 |isbn=978-0-415-03586-6 |page=5 |quote=Not only are the English Channel and the Southern North Sea, in particular, the busiest shipping clearways in the world, but the seas are also sources of the European community's industrial wealth (fisheries, petroleum, aggregates, and power) and sinks for the disposal of refuse from its intensely urbanized and industrialized coats.}}</ref> The [[Channel Tunnel]], opened in 1994, links Great Britain to France and is the second-longest rail tunnel in the world.

The idea of building a [[Irish Sea tunnel|tunnel under the Irish Sea]] has been raised since 1895,<ref>"Tunnel Under the Sea", ''[[The Washington Post]]'', 2 May 1897 [https://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost_historical/access/282943272.html?dids=282943272:282943272&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT&date=MAY+02%2C+1897&author=&pub=The+Washington+Post&desc=TUNNEL+UNDER+THE+SEA&pqatl=google (Archive link)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121103065904/http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost_historical/access/282943272.html?dids=282943272:282943272&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT&date=MAY+02%2C+1897&author=&pub=The+Washington+Post&desc=TUNNEL+UNDER+THE+SEA&pqatl=google |date=3 November 2012}}.</ref> when it was first investigated. Several potential Irish Sea tunnel projects have been proposed, most recently the Tusker Tunnel between the ports of [[Rosslare Europort|Rosslare]] and [[Fishguard]] proposed by [[The Institute of Engineers of Ireland]] in 2004.<ref>{{Citation|title=Tunnel 'vision' under Irish Sea|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/south_west/4121001.stm|publisher=[[BBC News]] |date=23 December 2004}}</ref> A rail tunnel was proposed in 1997 on a different route, between [[Dublin]] and [[Holyhead]], by British engineering firm Symonds. Either tunnel, at {{convert|50|mi|0|abbr=on}}, would be by far the longest in the world, and would cost an estimated £15&nbsp;billion (€20&nbsp;billion). A proposal in 2007,<ref>{{Cite news |date=21 August 2007 |title=From Twinbrook to the Trevi Fountain |publisher=[[BBC News]] |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/6956570.stm |access-date=}}</ref> estimated the cost of building a bridge from [[County Antrim]] in Northern Ireland to [[Galloway]] in Scotland at £3.5bn (€5bn).