Airport News
Below are news items relating to specific airports
Row sparks over call for £600k Manston airport ‘sweetener’ from taxpayer
Date added: 16 June, 2011
The government has been urged to offer a £600,000 "sweetener" to an unnamed commercial
airline planning a new daily service from Manston to an unnamed European destination
from next April, it has emerged though an FoI request. The airport operator Infratil
is in advanced confidential talks with an unidentified airline. Now it has been
revealed Kent County Council and Infratil pressed for a taxpayers’ handout to
underwrite the costs of the service for 3 years.
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Plans for Enterprise Zone around Coventry Airport
Date added: 14 June, 2011
Business leaders are proposing to make a planned development near Coventry Airport and the Tollbar A45 junction an enterprise zone for the area. The Coventry and Warwickshire Local Enterprise Partnership has until the end of June to table its nomination for
a zone to the Government. Enterprise zones will seek to boost development and economic growth through tax
breaks, reduced planning restrictions and other inward investment advantages.
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Airport plan ‘threatens to destroy wildlife’ on remote Atlantic island, St Helena
Date added: 13 June, 2011
St Helena, a tiny volcanic island in the South Atlantic, and one of the most remote inhabited places – looks set to change for ever with the
construction of an airport and a 300-acre luxury hotel, villa and golf course
complex. The scheme is dividing islanders and causing alarm among wildlife and
heritage conservationists. British taxpayers are set to spend up to £300m on a new airport, to be sited
in one of the island's most sensitive ecological zones.
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Manston: Yet another job forecast – from the once-secret KCC funding bid
Date added: 12 June, 2011
The local group, No Night Flights at Manston, have found out, through FoI, that Kent
County Council has been trying to get Regional Growth Fund money. KCC wanted a
handout of some £10.8 million to support their ill-judged proposal for a Parkway
station at Manston, and some free money for the airport. Manston are says that with 23 extra staff they could handle twice the current
tonnage of freight, and 750,000 passengers a year (cf. 21,000 passengers in 2010)
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Birmingham Airport “saved from night flight ban” as interim measure by Solihull Council
Date added: 11 June, 2011
The airport has been given the go-ahead - as an interim measure - by Solihull
Council to base the number of night time flights allowed in 2011 on the busiest
year during the past 5 years, rather than on recession-hit 2010. The airport
is claiming a boom in business in the Midlands means there is a need to (for some
unknown reason) to bring in more parts during the night. The airports is otherwise
likely to reach its annual quota of night flights well before the end of the year.
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Aviation Minister, Theresa Villiers, to consider launching Heathrow noise study
Date added: 10 June, 2011
Heathrow's impact on the health of neighbouring residents could be the subject
of a government study. Theresa Villiers promised to consider launching a full assessment when she met
leading politicians from Hounslow, who are trying to improve life for people living under the flightpath. They are demanded better noise insulation for schools and a total ban on night flights. Also
improved public transport links to the airport and the retention of runway alternation.
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Swans moved on from City Airport amid bird-strike safety fears
Date added: 9 June, 2011
Bosses at London City Airport have been dealing with a serious threat to aircraft
— wild swans. The number of birds congregating close to the Silvertown airport has increased
to “unmanageable levels” in recent months. "Bird strikes” are the most common cause of aircraft accidents. The City Airport
swans have been transferred to a new home at Windsor. The airport wants residents
to avoid feeding wild birds, as it encourages them to settle.
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Birmingham Airport to “talk to its neighbours” about its plans to increase night flights
Date added: 8 June, 2011
The airport is inviting members of the local community to discuss all airport-related
activity, particularly its night flying policy at several community meetings. The airport is trying to get more night flights (23.30 - 06.00), above the number
it had previously agreed to. It wants dispensation to increase numbers over 5%
of the total, as flights were down last year, so it feels the restriction is too
tight. Also meeting a tighter noise level of 85 db (a) would be too hard for
them.
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Heathrow Greenwash: BAA marks World Environment Day with its Sustainability Performance Plan for 2010
Date added: 7 June, 2011
BAA has marked Environment Day (5th June) by producing its Sustainability Performance
Summary for 2010. It contains all sorts of good things like improving the passenger
experience, reducing contruction accidents, and investing £7.5 million in local
community projects. They say they reduced the airport's total carbon footprint
by almost 150,000 tonnes CO2e compared to 2008. That is just a bit less than 0.5%
of total emissions by planes using Heathrow. Not a lot !
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BMI baby moves base to save money and help keep cost of flights low
Date added: 3 June, 2011
BMI Baby has moved into the base of its parent company, BMI Group, in order to cut costs.
It has moved 80 staff who were based since 2002 at Pegasus Business Park, next to East Midlands Airport, to Donington Hall. It has announced plans to focus its operations on the Midlands. It is pulling out of Cardiff and Manchester airports only leaving Birmingham, Belfast
City and East Midlands. It will add 2 planes at East Midlands, making the total
number there 8.
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