Leeds Bradford Airport expansion plans approved
years, have been backed by councillors.
lounge, an improved check-in area and an expanded security zone.
the impact on roads around the airport.
to and from the airport.
private equity firm Bridgepoint Capital, which bought the airport for £145m last
year.
the airport to serve the demand for air travel from this region.
than we have total passenger numbers.
but APPROVED the £28m airport expansion. The vote itself passed on a knife edge
– out of the 8 Councillors present for the decision, 1 abstained, 3 voted against,
and 4 voted for. The Panel voted to defer the decision until a number of conditions were met,
but once these conditions have been satisfied the Planning Department may approve
the expansion, a process that will take a matter of weeks.
and for anyone concerned about the devastating impacts of climate change.
several key junctions close to the airport would be over capacity on Fridays,
and projections from Friends of the Earth show clearly that the airport’s expansion
plans would mean the airport would consume all of Leeds’ carbon budget by 2050.
on by Council officers and Leeds Bradford Airport.
avenues to explore that may stop, delay, or reduce the expansion. We’ll be discussing
where to go next at an open meeting on Tuesday 4th August, 3PM-5PM please feel free to come along, here more about what’s happened, and explore
options for moving forward. Email
campaign – and it may not even be over yet!
We have demonstrated the strength of public opposition to airport expansion Out of an unprecedented 2200 letters of representation to the Council, 80% were
against expansion.
We have stopped unconstrained growth at LBA When the proposal was first considered by the Plans Panel, there was a very real
danger that the proposal would allow growth of up to 7m passengers per annum (mppa)
at the airport, up from 3mppa!. Now further permission must be sought if the airport
wishes to go above 4.5mppa
We have engaged Councillors with the issue From the arguments they were using and the questions they were asking we unequivocally
got our point across.To have such a tight vote in the face of overwhelming odds is an achievement
in itself!
We have delayed the expansion Every tonne of carbon that goes into the atmosphere warms the planet that little
more and costs lives.Our actions have likely delayed this scheme by a year – that’s a full year less
of increased carbon emissions into the atmosphere.Meanwhile, out in the real world, air traffic at the airport is crumbling, probably
down to around 2.5mppa this year and next; so that means that for the moment the
CO2 emissions will be falling as well!It’s very unlikely that the expansion ambitions of the new private owner Bridgepoint
will ever be achieved, and the returns on their £150m investment will have slumped.
Now they’ve got to shell out £28m on a new terminal with millions fewer passengers
expected.
We have built a strong, nimble, powerful coalition This is not the first time we’ll have to respond to an issue like this.
We’ve built a powerful coalition that has a model for future work.