Birmingham Airport anti-Noise Group

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Monday 31st October 2005

BIA Master Plan: Residents told 'noise, pollution, traffic will get worse - but be thankful for small mercies'

After a year-long delay, [1] Birmingham Airport will today (Monday 31st October) publish its new Draft Master Plan, 'Towards 2030: Planning a Sustainable Future for Air Transport in the Midlands'. The Draft Master Plan sets out the Airport Company's strategy for delivering a three-fold expansion, including a new second runway, runway extension and third terminal, in line with the Government's twenty-five-year vision of UK air transport growth.

James Botham, Secretary of BANG, said:

"The message of this new Draft Master Plan is: it's going to get worse, but be thankful for small mercies. The Airport Company has admitted that day and night noise, air pollution, and road traffic will all increase as a result of BIA's expansion.[2] When challenged about the impacts of its planned three-fold growth, the Airport has consistently evaded the issue, preferring simply to remind us of how much more damaging the Government's original, now long defunct, wide-spaced second runway option [3] would have been. But that's just not good enough; the fact that the situation could be a whole lot worse - which we don't dispute - doesn't mean it couldn't be a whole lot better."

"BANG welcomes the strong emphasis BIA has placed on the issue of environmental 'sustainability' throughout the Master Plan Review process and, of course, we accept that the Airport can never reduce its environmental impact to zero. But local residents are entitled to expect that the disturbance they suffer as a result of the Airport's operations should, at the very least, not get any worse over the years. With this Master Plan, BIA have proved themselves unable to meet those expectations. We remain unconvinced that growth on the scale envisaged by the Master Plan can be achieved without the local community suffering a significant deterioration in their local environment and quality of life."

Commenting on the new compensation proposals published with the Master Plan, James Botham said:

"We are pleased that BIA appears to have taken on board some of our criticisms of the previous draft compensation proposals put out for consultation last year.[4] In drawing up these new compensation schemes, the Airport Company have at least managed to iron out the more egregious howlers; for instance, they seem to have grasped, like BAA Stansted, that a scheme boundary based on noise contours 'can be no more than a proxy for where generalised blight might exist'.[5] Although projected noise contours for the new second runway still form the basis for the scheme boundaries, 'sensitivity has been exercised in determining where the actual boundary line has been drawn'.[6] This should introduce the flexibility needed to prevent residential roads, alleys and even individual properties being bisected by arbitrary lines drawn on a map and finding themselves half-in-half-out of the scheme. However, the devil, as they say, is in the detail, and we will be scrutinising these new proposals very closely in the coming weeks."

It is understood that the final adopted Master Plan, due out later next year, will not have any statutory status, but will inform the preparation of regional and local planning policy.

However, James Botham added:

"Although the Master Plan itself has no statutory status, the real danger is that it will find its way into statutory planning policy via the Regional Spatial Strategy and the Local Development Framework, and in the process become legally binding on Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council. Such an outcome, which would severely limit the scope for community representation and participation when, eventually, planning applications for the new runway, terminal and other developments are submitted, must be resisted to the hilt. The Master Plan is a commercial business plan, nothing more; it must not be allowed to dictate the planning policy of a democratically elected local government."

Editor's Notes

1. The Government's 2003 Air Transport White Paper required all airports handling over 20,000 passenger movements a year to produce (or update their existing) Master Plans by the end of 2004, a deadline which has since slipped to the end of 2005. BIA's new Draft Master Plan can be viewed at www.bhx.co.uk.

2. The Master Plan Executive Summary reports that noise (both day and night-time), air pollution and road traffic will increase as a result of the airport's expansion:

"The increase in ATMs from 2010 through to 2030 leads to an increase in the populations exposed to corresponding day and night noise contours" and "the night noise contours reflect a growth in average noise over the period 2010 to 2030" (Executive Summary, paragraphs 10.6 & 10.7).

"The forecast growth of Birmingham International Airport will place increased demands on the surface transport network and systems". (Executive Summary, paragraph 9.2).

Although "The results of the air quality study do not predict any future year exceedences in terms of air quality standards", "the results generally show increases in emissions, in line with expectations that would result from increased air and road traffic" (Executive Summary, paragraph 10.13).

3. As outlined in the Department for Transport's 2002 consultation on the future of air transport in the UK.

4. See BANG's response to last year's compensation consultation:

'4.09 It is not sufficient for BIA simply to shrug off the fact that 'there will always be some properties that fall outside the [noise contour] boundary when near neighbours are within it' [Birmingham International Airport Ltd., 'Master Plan Review: Voluntary Compensation Schemes', August 2004, p4.] Even BAA Stansted admits that a boundary based on noise contours 'can be no more than a proxy for where generalised blight might exist'. It would be reasonable for BIA to insist on professional valuation advice to demonstrate that a property outside the contour had been devalued as a consequence of the development proposals but to arbitrarily exclude properties by drawing lines on a map is unjust. Noise contours can only serve as a general guide to eligibility and there must be the flexibility within the scheme to accommodate natural community boundaries and individuals' circumstances.'

5. BAA Stansted, 'Home Owner Support Scheme', September 2004, p10.

6. BIA's Property Value Protection scheme has been amended so that 'if the noise contour goes through any part of a property, building or garden, it has been included' and 'If the contour goes through one of a pair of semi-detached properties then both properties are included". Moreover, 'the boundary has been moved out to follow a clear physical feature - such as the centreline of a road or an alleyway.' These are all welcome changes. However, by reiterating that 'there will always be some properties that fall outside the boundary when near neighbours are within it', BIA have admitted to an intrinsic flaw in their compensation proposals.

Read BANG's submission to the Draft Master Plan public consultation