Birmingham Airport anti-Noise Group
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#5
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February 2003
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Birmingham Airport anti-Noise Group |
Newsletter
#5 |
February 2003 |
Aircraft Noise: It's Taking The Peace
With a week to go before the Government’s Consultation on the Future of Air Transport was due to close, BANG joined Birmingham Friends of Earth and SOAR in a noise protest from Solihull to Sutton Coldfield.
Saturday 23rd November saw campaigners from BANG, Solihull Opposing Additional Runways (S.O.A.R.) and Birmingham Friends of the Earth charging through the City to protest against the proposed Wide Spaced second runway at Birmingham Airport. From Elmdon, Solihull to Boldmere, Sutton Coldfield a recording of aircraft noise was blasted out of two loud speakers mounted on the back of a truck. The truck followed a route that traces the would-be flight path of the second runway. The aim was to warn residents about what lies in store for them if the new runway goes ahead - intolerable levels of noise disturbance and pollution from aircraft.
Of course, the good thing about the aircraft noise we were blasting out is that it was temporary. At the end of the day we could turn it off. But if the Wide Spaced second runway goes ahead at Birmingham Airport and the planes start coming overhead for real then there won’t be an off switch - ever.
We are angry that Birmingham City Council did not follow the lead of its Solihull counterpart and reject the expansion proposals outlined in the Department for Transport’s Consultation. The new runway will not only have devastating consequences for Solihull but will also mean hundreds of thousands of Birmingham people are exposed to aircraft noise and pollution night and day.
On Sunday we took the protest to Solihull town centre, much to the surprise of shoppers leaving the Touchwood Centre. Both days were extremely successful, with lots of good media coverage and engagement with the public. Thanks and well done to everyone who took part on the day.
Sutton Meeting: The Plot Thickens
In our last newsletter we reported on our abortive attempts to stage a public meeting in Sutton Coldfield about the proposed expansion of Birmingham Airport. We a booked twice at two schools in the area, Plantsbrook Comprehensive and Town Junior, but both suddenly cancelled our bookings on the grounds that there had been "trouble" at one of our previous meetings.
There had never been any trouble at any public meetings we had either organised or attended, so we took the matter to Birmingham City Council's Education Department. They have recently revealed to us that they were contacted by Plantsbrook School concerning "trouble" at a public meeting, but that this had in fact occurred at a meeting in Bedford, not Birmingham. Needless to say, BANG has never held a public meeting in Bedford. Are we, as one local paper suggested at the time, victims of a rumour campaign?
We are continuing to look into the matter, as we had had 4000 fliers printed for the Plantsbrook meeting before it was cancelled and we are still out of pocket to the tune of £94 printing costs.
Confusion Still Hangs Over Airports Consultation
As I'm sure you are all by now aware, the Government's Consultation on the Future of Air Transport has been extended following a legal challenge from Medway, Kent, and Essex County Council concerning the exclusion of Gatwick Airport from the document.
The case against the Government was heard in the High Court between 13 and 15 November 2002 and on 26 November Mr Justice Maurice Kay rejected most of those grounds of challenge. However, he found that the decision to exclude the Gatwick options was unlawful on three grounds and so ruled that it should be quashed. Transport Secretary Alistair Darling said that he would not appeal against the ruling.
We understand that the second round of consultation together with a second document are not expected until late February/early March and will run for four months. Alistair Darling has said that an Aviation White Paper will not be published before October, but it now looks like the White Paper may not appear until the end of the year or even until early next year.
All this means you are still free to submit your consultation responses now or wait until the second document is published. In particular, the DfT welcomes responses from those whose views are unlikely to be affected by options at Gatwick. If you have already submitted a response they will take this into account. You will also be able to add to, amend or replace your response later when you have had an opportunity to consider the new material. Background reports and the six consultation documents covering the other parts of the UK will continue to be available. You can also call the DfT's consultation hotline on 0845 100 5554 for more information.
AirportWatch is planning to organise a Campaigners Conference in the Spring after the second round of consultation has been published. We'll let you know more when the date has been fixed.
Thank You . . .
To everyone who forwarded us their own responses
to the Air Transport Consultation.
They made for inspiring reading. BANG's official response is reproduced below. . .
"BANG welcomes the opportunity to participate in consultation but cannot support any of the scenarios for expansion at Birmingham Airport (BIA), namely Maximum Use, Closed Spaced second runway, Wide Spaced second runway and BIA’s own “Alternative” Wide Spaced option. Neither do we view airport expansion/development elsewhere in the region or elsewhere in the UK as acceptable alternatives.
The Government must remove the hidden subsides and tax concessions afforded to the industry which help to inflate demand through artificially low ticket prices. If the aviation industry was made to internalise its external costs the effect would be to constrain growth in air traffic over the next 30 years at a level that can be accommodated within existing capacity at Birmingham Airport. This would remove the need for new or extended runways.
Instead of accommodating growth forecasts based on predict and provide we call for a policy of demand management. It cannot be assumed that the aviation industry will still be in the privileged position it now enjoys even ten years down the line. If the proposed expansion goes ahead then scores of communities will be blighted, whether the predicted growth in air travel materialises or not.
The Government’s own estimates suggest that 180,000 people will suffer noise disturbance if BIA is allowed to expand fully. The areas of Hodge Hill, Castle Bromwich, Sheldon, Shard End, Erdington and Sutton Coldfield are already severely affected by aircraft noise along the existing flight path without a second runway adding to the problem. A total of 22 local schools would sit under the flight path of the Wide Spaced second runway. Last year, UK Government and EU Commission funded studies suggested that chronic aircraft noise exposure severely impairs children’s learning in schools near Heathrow.
The suffering caused by aircraft noise must be more widely acknowledge and thought given to better mitigation and compensation for people living under flight paths. This could be a discount from Council tax banding or reduction in Council rents. It should also apply to a much wider range of community buildings. Furthermore, we would urge the DfT to adopt the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) figure of 50 dbA for the onset of noise disturbance instead of the current figure of 57dbA.
We have found that within Birmingham there are still many residents who will be subject to increased disturbance from a greater number of flights along existing and future flight paths who do not know about the full implications of the Consultation. It has largely fallen to local volunteers and campaign groups to do the job of Government in informing people of what the proposals will mean for them. Birmingham City Council’s Ward Sub Committee Meetings and it’s one Sustainability Forum devoted to airport issues were poorly attended with most of those present comprising individuals already tuned in to the issues. Local residents have for the most part been left out of the process.
For many of those who were able to take part in the Consultation, the Questionnaire provided with the main document was felt to be inadequate for conveying their response. Many, including BANG, preferred to put their response in writing directly to the Department for Transport. This goes also for the enclosed responses, gathered at public meetings organised by BANG.
It is imperative that the industry operates a far more open and inclusive form of participation and engagement. It is also time that much more open consultative committees were set up, funded by the industry but operated independently of it, to secure better mitigation and compensation for local people. We also wish to see strict environmental limits imposed at airports to limit residents’ exposure to aircraft noise and pollution.
Finally, BANG wants to see expansion at Birmingham Airport capped at the level agreed in 1996, when the airport was given permission to almost double its capacity over ten years."
A Brief Digest of Press Opinion on Airport Issues
In a debate that could so easily have been obscured by Government spin and aviation industry scare-mongering, it was encouraging to see so many figures in the mainstream media fighting our corner on the issue of airport development. Below are some of our favourite quotes from the last year's papers.
“The
industry-led Freedom to Fly campaign argues that airport expansion is essential
to Britain’s economic prosperity, but one man’s economic freedom fighter
is another man’s environmental terrorist. If aviation is allowed to grow
unchecked, more people living near airports will suffer health-damaging levels
of noise and air pollution. . . In 1989, in a White Paper entitled 'Roads for
Prosperity', the Conservative Government promised the biggest road-building
programme since the Romans. The policy ended in tears because middle England
did not want the countryside covered in tarmac. There is a danger the forthcoming
air transport White Paper will suffer the same fate. It is not too late to develop
a sustainable aviation policy.”
Tony
Grayling, The Independent, 1 Sep '02
“For
Mr Darling tamely to assume he must provide an already tax-favoured industry
with yet more airports, regardless of the human and environmental cost in noise,
congestion and air pollution, would be a disaster.”
Mark
Middleton-Smith, Evening Standard, 14 Jan '03
"An
emissions tax, the airlines argue, will be a tax on holidays. Well, so be it;
travelling by air, compared with car or train, is far too cheap."
Brian
Sewell, Evening Standard, 3 Dec '02
"It
is an odd time to be calling for more airports. British Airways has sacked almost
10,000 staff and lost its FTSE 100 ranking; United looks like becoming the next
carrier to go bankrupt. Yet the Government’s consultation on the Future
of Air transport . . . insists that airport expansion is vital for the economy.
The Department for Transport acknowledges that the subsidies keep fares artificially
low, but has no immediate plans to remove them. Part of the problem, of course,
is that airlines compete internationally, and no country wants to be put at
a disadvantage. Yet the mood in Europe is changing. The European Commission
has implied that its member states may impose aviation fuel taxes themselves
if ICAO, the international body responsible, fails to agree a formula. Who would
have thought, after all, that the Swiss Government would let Swissair go bankrupt?
The Germans plan to end all internal flights within the next ten years, and
switch passengers to high-speed rail."
Camilla Cavendish,
The Times, 3 Dec '02
"A
single return trip to New York dumps as much carbon dioxide into the air per
passenger as a car produces in six months, about a ton of it. When the Americans
stopped flying for a while after September 11 . . . the temporary removal of
aeroplane-derived pollution in the sky meant that the world’s temperature
actually dropped by more than 2 degrees Fahrenheit."
Adam
Nicholson, The Telegraph, 3 Dec '02
"But,
the aviation lobby argues, trying to damp down the growth in aviation will restrict
people’s freedom to fly. Stuff and nonsense. There is no God-given right
to fly around the world at fares which do not reflect the damaging environmental
effects caused by commercial aircraft."
Christian
Wolmar, Evening Standard, 26 July '02
"We
all smiled at the silliness when a European court ruled last year that our human
rights included the right to a decent night's sleep and that right was infringed
by night flights. But there is nothing funny about aircraft noise. Studies show
that children who live under flight paths suffer fro poor memory and have greater
difficulty in learning to read. And it's no good saying that people knew what
to expect when they bought their houses. Many did not. Over the years people
living near airports have been consistently misled with false promises about
the number of flights."
John
Humphrys, The Sunday Times, 25 Nov '01
"If
life is to continue to be worth living in this island, sooner or later a government
must display courage in telling the country that public 'demand' is not the
same as public 'need'. . . Yes, the public loves to fly to Spain for £30,
but it is the duty of government to recognise the bitter additional premium
paid on that fare, by every hapless citizen underneath the flight path . . .
If the Transport Secretary simply succumbs to the latest industry forecasts
and approves most of the proposals outlined in the consultation papers, then
he will fail in his responsibility to the people of this country as citizens,
whatever he may think he has done for them as travellers."
Max
Hastings, The Guardian, 28 July '02
Mainland Europe Without The Plane
Trips to continental Europe can all be made from Birmingham by train.
You can plan your trip on line at the German Railways site www.deutsche-bahn.co.uk, by phoning the agent or (for less complete information) in the Thomas Cook European Timetable. Some useful telephone numbers are: German Railways (08702 435363); Ludlow Station Travel (01584 877090); Wasteels Travel (0207 8347066); and Rail Europe (01766 512340 or visit www.raileurope.co.uk)
Take Action!
How many Valentines did you get this year,
Minister?
Friday 14th February is Valentines Day and we want to send a special message to Secretary of State for Transport Alistair Darling about how the Department for Transport's airport expansion plans are breaking Birmingham's heart.
Send
off the enclosed card to: Alistair Darling, Department
for Transport, Eland House, Bressenden Place, London, SW1E 5DU.
The Airport: A Poem
When I first bought my house
For my young daughter and spouse
At aircraft we’d look up and stare
For they were very few
So we stared at the view
At planes flying up in the air
As the years passed on by
They continued to fly
As they became larger and louder
We no longer looked
For we were no longer hooked
As they passed we’d grind our teeth to powder
Since the Century’s passed
We still suffer the blast
As they roar overhead day and night
The airport wants to grow more
Which will increase the roar
And at the same, increase our plight
A summer day in the garden
Just makes my resolve harden
And while I don’t wish to sound like a nerd
As overhead they pass
While I’m cutting the grass
Not a word that I say can be heard
The Airport must not grow
It is time we said No!
We do not require more pollution
Every dog has its day
It’s now time for us to say
They must find another solution.
COLIN G ANKCORN
Steetly, Sutton Coldfield, Nov '02
Copyright of Author