The rumours have been rumbling for a few weeks but finally, plans to increase night flights at Heathrow have been revealed! Campaigners against the proposed expansion of Heathrow, the 2M group, have discovered in Sir Howard Davies’ interim report plans to increase night flights from 16 to 35! The proposal, hidden within a technical appendix, would mean that Heathrow could land more airplanes between 5am and 6am, which would impact homes under the flight path in Putney and Battersea.
Under the section called ‘early morning smoothing’, a recommendation that is due to be trialled in 2015, it is believed that this proposal would reduce delays, plus Heathrow would be able to utilise just one runway for arrivals from 6am until 8am – they currently use two runways. It is also said that those living under the flight path would have a respite from flight noise as there would be no airplanes flying overhead alternate weeks.
Spokesperson for the 2M group, Councillor Ravi Govindia, has said they will be fighting the proposals, adding that these ‘smoothing’ proposals should have been revealed much earlier. He added: “Today there are 725,000 homes in the area around Heathrow where noise exceeds the standard EU measure for annoyance. This compares to 11,900 around Gatwick and 9,000 around Stansted. But so far, Davies is not adopting the EU standard for noise so he can claim fewer people are affected. This is keeping Heathrow in the running for new runways.”
A spokesperson for the Airports Commission has said that in order to provide a respite for local communities, they recommend a trial of ‘early morning smoothing’, from which they, and the community, will be able to ascertain the impact it has.
Running trials is usually considered a good way of finding out whether a proposal or plan is going to be effective or detrimental. The difference with this trial is that not only is it a highly sensitive subject matter; it is also the impact it may have on a very high number of people. Ultimately, in order for our airports to remain competitive in the worldwide environment, there needs to be investment and expansion.