Getaway begins with 800,000 at Heathrow

Thousands of families are set to leave the capital this weekend as the Christmas getaway begins.

Hundreds of schools will close for the holidays tomorrow and Londoners are expected to flood out of the capital by air, road and rail.

Nearly 800,000 passengers will pass through Heathrow between tomorrow and Sunday. Meanwhile, 16,000 passengers are expected to leave London by Eurostar tomorrow alone.

As many as 4.25million Britons are likely to head overseas before January 3, according to travel organisation Abta, up from four million last year.

Around 1.7million will be leaving from Heathrow, 750,000 from Gatwick, 425,000 from Stansted and 210,000 from Luton. Those staying at home will face problems getting around by Tube and rail.

Mainline trains will stop running as early as 5pm on Christmas Eve and there will be none on Christmas Day and very few on Boxing Day, when they will be limited for the most part to services to airports including Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted.

A three-day strike by signalling staff in Scotland threatens to disrupt long distance West Coast Main Line services to the North from 6am on Christmas Eve. Aslef Tube drivers have voted for a 24-hour strike on Boxing Day.

Between December 27 and the New Year there will be disruption on routes including First Great Western because of engineering work. The congestion charge will be suspended from December 24 until January 2.