Airport News
Below are news items relating to specific airports
Hounslow spending £150 million trying to limit Heathrow plane noise from 40 local schools
Hounslow has a plane landing or taking off over it at least once per minute for most of the day. With noise loud enough to make it difficult to hold a conversation outside while a plane goes over, and loud enough to make speech and teaching difficult indoors, this is a serious problem for schools under Heathrow's flight path. The airport is well aware of the issue and that children have little option but to be in schools there. A teacher at a primary school some 2km from the airport’s south runway, said: “We’re in classrooms where we have to shut the blinds, we have to stop speaking, the air quality’s not very good and in the summer the temperature soars. But you can’t open the windows because of the noise, so it’s like we’re in a greenhouse melting.” Hounslow now has a £150m school rebuilding programme which aims to provide quieter classrooms in 40 schools under Heathrow’s flight path, over 5 years, partly by a heavyweight construction approach that incorporates a highly insulated concrete structural envelope. This cuts noise and gives more thermal stability. Unless there is proper ventilation, and air cooling in summer, just triple glazing and closed windows are not enough.
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Unite union calls for more time to help save Blackpool airport jobs after closure on 15th
Unite Union bosses have called on Balfour Beatty to think again about the rapid closure of Blackpool Airport to give parties more time to come up with a rescue package to save jobs. As no buyer has been found for the airport, it will close on 15th October. Although air traffic control and fire cover will also end at that point, the smaller general aviation companies will continue to operate. However, more than 100 jobs are set to go - including fire fighters, security, air traffic controllers and administrative staff - and the long term future of the airport now lies under a cloud as Balfour Beatty, MPs, local councils and the Lancashire Enterprise Partnership continue to look for ways to retain aviation use of the site while making the best use of the 400 acres to support jobs and the local economy. Unite said “Because it is going to be made insolvent then our members will have to claim back their redundancy and any back holiday pay from the state." Unite wants the owners to rethink. The Blackpool area already has high unemployment, and a shortage of skilled or well-paid work.
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Heathrow says flight paths being tested are “not indicative of future flight paths” Really?
Heathrow airport has managed to thoroughly upset and anger thousands or residents in areas affected by its flight path trials. The airport had some 500 complaints per day last month - the highest number in its history, and it can barely cope with them. There has been particular anger that there was no warning about the trials, even to the Mayor's office or to local councils. The flight path changes are part of a drive to overhaul the UK’s airspace by 2020 and use more accurate precision navigation technology - which means narrow, concentrated flight paths that make things easier for air traffic control, to get more planes into the same airspace. NATS wants this "for the UK to remain competitive." How Heathrow's PR people have said that the routes being tested “are not indicative of future flight paths”. But that seems difficult to believe. Looking at maps produced by Heathrow earlier, for the Airports Commission, the routes there seem to be remarkably similar to those on trial, over Ascot and nearby areas. The document says they are "indicative and subject to consultation". When is an indicative flight path not indicative ?
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Belfast International Airport seeks enterprise zone status
Belfast International Airport is planning to seek enterprise zone status, to become similar to Manchester's Airport City. The Manchester one was confirmed as one of the government's enterprise zones in March 2011, and is able to offer businesses incentives to locate there to create new jobs and stimulate economic growth. Belfast International airport has 100 acres of developable land, and it wants to get enterprise zone status from the government, so it can include logistics centres, warehouses, distribution, offices and leisure uses. But the airport does not have many long haul flights, and tourism in Northern Ireland is below the volume they would like. Belfast International only had around 4 million passengers in 2013, (compared to Belfast City airport, with about 2.5 million). It had about 5.2 million on 2007 and 2008, so has been in decline for some time.
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Vince Cable: Gatwick runway is “a preferable alternative” and “less problematic” than Heathrow runway
Vince Cable, the Liberal Democrat business secretary, is reported as saying, at the LIb Dem party conference, that he backs the expansion of Gatwick over Heathrow. His speech on Monday did not mention airports, but he is reported by the BBC as saying expansion at Gatwick was "a preferable alternative" and "less problematic" than a third runway at Heathrow. His constituency of Twickenham is close to Heathrow, and badly overflown. So it unsurprising that he has previously voiced his opposition to a new Heathrow runway. In December 2013 Mr Cable said: "The Davies Commission interim report has put Heathrow at the front of its thinking which is questionable economically, damaging environmentally and probably undeliverable politically.... I fully support the need to improve UK business links with airports in the emerging markets of Asia which is important for jobs, but this could be achieved more quickly by reforming and reallocating airport slots; by building up point to point services; and by strengthening the capacity of UK regional airports." He wants the UK economy to be "knowledge based, outward looking, and green."
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Lib Dems hoping to get more votes by dropping opposition to Gatwick runway
The Liberal Democrats voted at the 2012 conference, exactly two years ago, against any new runway at Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted or the Thames estuary. But just a short time later, they have apparently abandoned their environmental principles, and decided to change policy, in the hope of saving some of their declining vote. Their pre-manifesto put out only on 9th September, reiterated the No New Runways message, though by June there were indications that they were wavering. Not there will be an amendment at the conference for a change to this policy, and for the Lib Dems to only oppose a runway at Heathrow. They are thus effectively discussing backing a Gatwick runway. Looking at the map showing location of Lib Dem constituencies, this is quite a cynical move. It seems the party has been led to believe that planes will become substantially "quieter" and "cleaner" and so a new runway would be environmentally acceptable. The problem is that there are no step changes in either aircraft carbon emissions or noise expected for decades. There will be a debate at the Lib Dem conference on Tuesday, and the industry will be there in force, lobbying hard.
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Willie Walsh of BA: Heathrow expansion is a ‘lost cause’
Willie Walsh, chief executive of BA owner, IAG, has said again that there will not be a 3rd Heathrow runway, as it is too controversial. He says UK politicians "lack the character" to get it built. “Historically, politicians have not been brave enough and I don’t think they will be brave enough going forward. You need a big shift in the politics of the country,” he said. However, Walsh warned a Conservative or Labour-led government against choosing Gatwick for an extra runway, adding that the case for growing the capital’s second-largest airport is “significantly weaker.” Gatwick did not have the same international attraction. He said: “You won’t find many airlines that say ‘God I’d love to be able to fly to Gatwick’. That’s why this isn’t a business issue, an economic argument. It’s a political argument and the politics of expanding Heathrow are significantly more difficult than the politics of expanding Gatwick.”
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British Airways adds more Heathrow leisure routes – Olbia, Kos, Corfu – to the existing list
Heathrow airport makes a lot of how important its flights to emerging economies are, and how limited its slots are for this. So it would be logical to imagine that spare slots would be used for just this sort of flight. Heathrow is keen on making statements like: "The UK will fall behind in the global race if it cannot connect to growing economies." And "Global air transport provides access for our key industries to established and emerging new markets, which will help deliver economic growth across the UK." So one might expect that, if spare slots come up, they would immediately be used for these long haul destination, to emerging economies. However, Heathrow will now be getting new British Airways flights to ... guess where? Olbia in Sardinia; Kos and Corfu in Greece and Split in Croatia from summer 2015. And these will use Airbus A319s and A320s. To be fair, it is moving its Las Palmas flights to Gatwick. Other purely holiday destinations Heathrow offers in the Med are Mykonos and Santorini, which started earlier this year. There are also Pisa and Porto. And the Heathrow destination map includes many, many more ... Ibiza, Nice, Tunis, Malta, Malaga ....
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Heathrow bows to extent of flight path fury by bringing end of trails forward to 12th November
On 28th August Heathrow started flight path trials, testing if flight paths could be concentrated, over flying slightly fewer people - but creating far more noise for those now under the narrow flight paths, used by more planes. As soon as the trials began people were upset, disturbed and annoyed at the noise misery that had been perpetrated upon them. Protests rapidly sprang up in the Ascot, Windlesham, Lightwater, Bagshot, Teddington, Twickenham and other areas. Heathrow has been stunned by, and swamped by, the number of complaints, and has not been able to cope. Now, as a damage-limitation exercise, Heathrow has announced it will cut its trials short, ending on 12th November, rather than the original end date of 26th January 2015. In addition, trials due to start on 28th October will be postponed till autumn 2015. This is good news for those who have been suffering. However, it is not a decision to stop growth in Heathrow flights - or noise. Cynics might say that these decisions are to ensure there is less protest about flight paths between now and the May 2015 election, and the Airports Commission decision on a new runway, expected after the election, next summer.
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“We didn’t think you’d notice”: Heathrow ‘apologises’ for not informing residents of new flight paths
Matt Gorman, the sustainability director of Heathrow airport, has told people in the Bracknell and Ascot areas why they were not given notice of the flight path trials overhead. He said: “We didn’t go as far as sending letters out to all the people that would be affected as we did not feel people would notice any change.” This is scarcely credible, unless Heathrow does not follow the news about rival Gatwick at all. The flight path trials at Gatwick have provoked massive opposition, with thousands highly angry and upset. Gatwick also decided not to give the public prior warning of their trial. At a Gatwick Consultative Committee meeting in January 2014, Gatwick's Head of Corporate Responsibility, said: "If people were aware of the trial it was possible that they would be more alert to changes and feel obliged to comment.” That backfired spectacularly. Another classic Heathrow comment recently, from Nigel Milton, to a meeting in Stanwell on 15th September, when asked why past Heathrow promises were allowed to be broken said: “The people who made those promises weren’t in a position to make these promises.” But the comment was made by the then BAA chairman, Sir John Egan. So Heathrow chairmen's promises should not be taken seriously?