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In deciding to move now and sell Gatwick, BAA is clearly striking while the iron is hot.
It could have waited until the Competition Commission produces its final report next year but who knows what the landscape for aviation may look like then.
Since the Commission produced its interim findings four weeks ago, the airport operator has had pretty firm expressions of interest from a variety of parties, including the owners of Manchester airport, a consortium including Virgin Atlantic, Australia's Macquarie financial group and Fraport, the German operator of several airports including those at Frankfurt.
Sir Nigel Rudd, BAA's chairman, is a canny operator, well versed in breaking up companies and extracting the best price for their constituent parts. He realises that to ignore this level of intent in such an unpredictable climate would have been foolhardy - better to go when the potential bidders say they have the money than to wait until a later date when they may not.
There is also a difference between selling in your own time and being forced to sell, once an official body decrees that you must. There was every chance that the value of Gatwick may have fallen once the Commission issued its conclusions. The proceeds also enable Ferrovial, BAA's Spanish owner, to boost its financial position.
So, while BAA said it did not agree with the watchdog's early recommendations, it is accepting them and moving ahead.
It may seem unwise, putting an airport up for sale when the property market has slumped, but BAA was apparently happy with what it was hearing from the potential bidders.
The Commission said that BAA should sell two of its three London airports. That was never going to be Heathrow. Gatwick has been selected now and not Stansted because at the latter, plans for a new, second runway are well advanced. To alter its ownership would be bound to delay that development. In the future, BAA can get far more for a Stansted with two runways than with one.
