Airport News
Below are news items relating to specific airports
Murad Qureshi: Boris has failed to get to grips with aircraft noise and needs to re-establish the GLA Noise Team
London Assembly Member, Murad Qureshi, writing in Left Foot Forward, says that in the aviation debate, the concerns of Londoners about aircraft noise are too frequently dismissed or regarded as secondary to other issues. "The Mayor of London has comprehensively failed to get to grips with aviation noise." Aabout 28% of all people in Europe affected by aircraft noise live under the Heathrow flight paths, and in the last decade the problem has spread across London with disturbance now being felt up to 20 km away from the airport. Heathrow’s noise mitigation scheme for affected residents is much less than that offered by London City Airport. "The first step to mitigate the issue of noise pollution must be for the Mayor to re-establish the GLA Noise Team which was shut down when the Mayor came to office. The team would be able to undertake a comprehensive update of the Mayor’s noise strategy which has not been revised in nine years."
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Packed public meeting in Stanwell Moor hears of threat of 850 house demolitions, noise and blight from Heathrow runway plans
Over 200 people attended a meeting in Stanwell Moor Village Hall, organised through the residents' association, on 3rd September, with standing room only. The people of Stanwell Moor face eviction and the demolition of their houses, and those in Stanwell face blight and an uncertain future - the possibility of intense aircraft noise and air pollution if another runway is allowed. There were people queuing outside trying to get in, such was the demand to hear what the Heathrow airport operators had in mind for their area. Nigel Milton, Heathrow's director of policy, said 850 homes in Stamwell Moor village would be demolished to make way for a 3,500 metre runway - if it was ever allowed. Kathy Croft, chairman of the Stanwell Moor Residents’ Association, said: “It will then be for the next government to act. Kwasi Kwarteng was invited but he gave his apologies ... ". The problem of large areas of blight that will inevitably be caused if the Airports Commission put Heathrow on their short list in December is a very real one. There will be another meeting on 18th September, organised by Spelthorne Borough Council.
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“Back Heathrow” campaign formed, by the airport, to demonstrate – and boost – local support for a 3rd runway
"Back Heathrow" is a lobby group that has recently been formed, by supporters of a third Heathrow runway. Its aim is to get people who favour Heathrow expansion to declare their support, and "give a voice to the hundreds of thousands of residents who support Heathrow." It has been set up with funding from the airport, and 400,000 local tabloid-style propaganda newspapers have been delivered to local communities surrounding the airport. The text of the paper is shown below. It pushes the scaremongering idea that there is a risk of Heathrow shutting down, causing the loss of "114,000 jobs" and that "200 of the UK's biggest companies may move from Heathrow." In reality, there is little prospect of Heathrow closing - and this is just a tactic to get publicity and worry people. Back Heathrow have written to local councillors, giving them the misleading impressing that it is a "new community campaign". It isn't. It is organised by the industry, not by the community. Hacan said the formation of "Back Heathrow" was “the actions of a desperate organisation, not confident of the arguments it is making.”
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Stansted campaigners urge Airports Commission to provide safeguards for communities against blight
Stop Stansted Expansion (SSE) is one of seven airport campaign groups who have joined forces in writing to Sir Howard Davies, Chairman of the Airports Commission, calling upon him to safeguard local residents against airport-related blight. The Commission is due to produce an interim report at the end of this year and, if it concludes that the UK needs more airport capacity, it will publish a short-list of options. The Commission's final report won't be published until mid-2015, after the next general election and it will then be for the Government of the day to take any final decisions. During that time, and perhaps for longer, the areas selected will suffer blight, and great uncertainty. The last time that Stansted was short-listed for major expansion, in 2002, £570 million was wiped off local house prices in the first 18 months of the threat, affecting an area of about 150 square miles. There is now the prospect of history repeating itself. Those who are promoting airport expansion projects must take some responsibility for the consequences. They cannot simply be allowed to dine out for free on their airport expansion dreams, leaving local residents to pick up the tab.
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AirportWatch calls on Airports Commission to safeguard communities under threat of blight from airport proposals
AirportWatch - which includes campaign groups at a number of airports facing the threat of expansion - have joined forces in writing to Sir Howard Davies, Chairman of the Airports Commission, calling upon him to safeguard all the threatened communities against blight. The Commission is due to produce an interim report at the end of this year and, if it concludes that the UK needs more airport capacity, it will publish a shortlist of options. The Commission's final report and recommendations won't be published until mid-2015, after the next general election, and it will then be for the Government of the day to take any final decisions. As soon as such a list is published, every single one of the areas under threat will be hit by generalised blight and people will immediately experience not only stress and uncertainty, but difficulties in selling their homes. The campaigners' letter asks Sir Howard "to make it a pre-condition for being shortlisted for the promoter of an airport development proposal to undertake to introduce fair and reasonable arrangements to address the problem of generalised blight arising from their proposal within three months of being shortlisted and to operate such arrangements for a minimum period of two years."
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Row as Belfast City Airport rejects EU directive to produce Noise Management Area
Belfast City Council is on a collision course with George Best City Airport after the airport declined to take measures recommended to protect residents affected worst by aircraft noise. Councillors have accused the airport of trying to wriggle out of its responsibilities after it refused to set up a Noise Management Area (NMA) in the residential area most affected by noise. Councillors say the airport must be held to their responsibilities. An EU Noise Directive recommended that a NMA where control measures would be in play should be set up for the 1% of residents most affected by aircraft. However, the airport has said this was merely a recommendation and it was only obliged to declare a NMA if the noise was louder. However, the airport's own draft noise action plan, published in June, found that over 8,000 people living near the airport suffer from a level of aircraft noise deemed by the UK Government to cause "significant community annoyance".
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Severnside airport, proposed by John Borkowski, would require closure of Bristol and Cardiff airports
One of the proposals for a huge new airport for the UK was for a Severnside Airport near Newport put forward by John Borkowski of MSP Solutions. There have been comments that his scheme is "far-fetched" and the plans would depend on the sale of the Welsh government-owned Cardiff airport and the privately-owned Bristol Airport - along with the transfer of their passengers and airlines to Severnside. Bristol called the plan unrealistic. But John Borkowski said there are too many regional airports and a larger hub would boost the economy. Previous proposals for a "Severnside" airport were rejected in 2003 by the UK government. Mr Borkowski's plan would include a 4,000m main runway with road links to the M4, sea links and rail links to the main London-Wales mainline. He says 1,000 people would be employed, while there is also potential for 10,000 support jobs, and the airport could handle 14 million passengers a year initially to around 40 million by 2050. Mr Borkowski said that with the potential closure of Heathrow in the future, (!?) it was important to consider developing a larger airport for the south west.
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Heathrow tries to make out that a 3rd runway and thousands more flights can help cut noise from flights
Heathrow airport is attempting to make out that building a 3rd runway, and adding on another 50% more flights will make the airport quieter. In this curiously distorted logic they say that a new runway to the south west could cut Heathrow noise pollution by 20% and one to the north by 10%. Heathrow has had a special session with the Airports Commission, to put their point of view. They set out a 5-point plan to reduce noise through quieter aircraft eg. A380s, a new runway to the west of the existing two, steeper gradients of take-off and landing, changing runway use to provide respite for residents and home insulation schemes. In reality, the claims of aircraft becoming quieter are exaggerated - measurement in aircraft noise is by a logarithmic scale, so a 50% theoretical cut in sound energy only give a cut of 3 decibels in the perceived noise. The number of noise events is more important than the current noise measurement metric allows for - and the standard 57 dB contour does not properly reflect the experience of noise intrusion on the ground. The 2M group want a new noise study to measure aircraft noise nuisance from Heathrow properly.
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2M group of councils call for new study into attitudes to aircraft noise
The 2M group of Councils opposed to Heathrow expansion - which initially included some 2 million residents, but now includes many more - has called for a new study to be carried out into attitudes to aircraft noise. Without an updated study, the councils fear the Airports Commission will be limited to basing their recommendations on sites for new airport capacity on surveys carried out more than 30 years ago. The 2M Group - made up of Wandsworth, Hounslow, Hillingdon, Richmond, Windsor and Maidenhead, Southwark, Brent, Hammersmith and Fulham, and South Bucks councils, have also republished the ANASE study into attitudes to aircraft noise which was rejected by the last Government in 2007. The study showed the official method for measuring community annoyance did not take account of the rising numbers of aircraft. The councils say that, while adopting the ANASE findings would provide the commission with a more robust benchmark, the real answer is to order a brand new study that properly reflects current attitudes.
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Air China suspends Gatwick-Beijing service for the winter – not enough demand
Much of the clamour by the aviation industry is for more airport capacity for more flights to the Far East and the emerging economies. The claims are that the UK will be left behind economically if there aren't frequent direct routes to numerous Chinese etc cities. However, it now emerges that Air China is to suspend its Beijing service from Gatwick from 27th October for the winter as there is not enough take up. It will probably resume in April 2014. The route was only started in 2012. Over the summer, the airline increased the size of aircraft used on its other UK route (Heathrow - daily), which has caused it to temporarily withdraw services from Gatwick for one season. The move appears to demonstrate that - despite strong load factors - the service is not viable year-round from 2 UK airports. Gatwick has suffered the loss of several long-haul routes - Korean Airlines suspended its Gatwick-Seoul route late last year and Hong Kong Airlines all-business class service was cancelled after only a few months of operation.