AIBU to have no sympathy for Heathrow runway debates

[NotForSale]

As the population increases surely another runway is needed to fulfil demand?
The biggest/ only argument I've seen against another runway is noise pollution. Is it just me or is that a 1st world problem? There's people who live in slums/ Calais camps/ overcrowding/ damp/ desperate poverty and quite frankly a bit of extra noise is the least of their worries.

There is been a multi year study looking at it. And the conclusion, despite all the political pressure is Heathrow.

Yet you can't quote a single number here.
I rest my case.

Also, who did the study, who commissioned it, what were the findinds.

Honestly, too seem to be spectacularly uninformed yet very firm in your convictions.

Don't let envy blind you.

We've got airports that are underused. What we need to don't get southerners, especially Londoners, to see that it everything has to be London based.

Doncaster has an airport with a huge runway. It is capable of taking the huge airbus and large freight planes. It is currently an underused airport, even despite the recent improvements to roads accessing it. It had rail access at one point but currently out of action.

However it's in the north. It'll never take off properly due to not being next to London - even though it's actually only a two hour rail service away.

We should make use of what we already have and force those decision makers to actually consider anything outside of the London area as a possibility.

We bought a house near an airport 6 years ago, and always said it should have been expanded as a proper regional airport. Despite being on the flight path the planes didn't bother us (unlike the police helicopters, but that's a different story).

They've recently sold it off and instead will build 1000s more houses on the land.

I know which I'd prefer .

And often they're underused BECAUSE of the lack of commitment by government, councils and decision makers to actually use them.

Doncaster was a classic example of this. Open an airport but don't put the infrastructure in place. Therefore no one can use it properly. The roads weren't set up decently and it's only this year the link road opened, several years after the airport was. The rail link is still not open nor are there plans to do so. Therefore passengers use it less and air companies withdraw.

We live in Sheffield. I'd love to travel more from Doncaster. We try and use Manchester, East Midlands and LBA as much as possible. Manchester is a busy airport and we fly from there often. But sometimes we still have to head to Heathrow or even worse Gatwick. Takes us ages to get there, but sometimes it's our only option to get to where we want to go. It's not because we actively choose London - we don't. It's nowhere near our first choice. It's just lack of options sometimes.

Because everything had to be based in and around London, and despite being a small country too many decision makers won't look beyond the M25!

Air pollution is already above legal limits around heathrow (and in the rest of London), why on earth is anyone suggesting that we should bring MORE congestion and jet fuel to that area???

It's fucking bonkers and Empressofthemundane show me an actual study that shows anything more than BAA and business interests getting fat off the backs of the poor people losing their homes and communities with massively decreasing quality of health for anyone living in west London.

The South East is massively overpopulated. The roads are awful. The countryside (which is some of the most fertile we have in England) is being built over to increase the accommodation in the a South East. The goverment really must look at the big picture. It says it is doing, but when it makes decisions like this one at Hearhrow, it clearly isn't.

However it's in the north. It'll never take off properly due to not being next to London - even though it's actually only a two hour rail service away.

How many people outside of the UK looking to come to trade here post-Brexit will look and think that Doncaster is a convenient airport for London? UK trains are hardly the best, and even if the rail link was in place they would still have to change trains. Really doesn't suggest the UK/London is open for business.

It's known that this adversely affects the education of children in schools under the flight paths. Is that a serious enough disadvantage for you? Why should they have to suffer for the sake of commercial interests?

Noone will come here post-brexit. there will be no economy anyway so its a bit of a moot point.

Are you arguing for no airports at all?

I thought the point of a hub airport was not to take people to London, but to be the connector airport between the rest of the U.K. and the rest of the world. So instead of having to go Edinburgh-Gatwick-Barbados (picking destinations randomly), you would go Edinburgh-Doncaster-Barbados. Doesn't matter to the Edinburgh passengers where they change planes, and reduces the pressure on London airports. If you want to go to London you go to Heathrow/Gatwick etc. No one is suggesting that you would go to Doncaster and then get on a train!

I can't see why Gatwick or Stansted weren't chosen. Either one could have had their connections to Heathrow improved hugely to make it a quicker, realistic transfer.
I feel sorry for the families that will be moved but, having lived really very close to the end of one of the runways at Heathrow, I'm always a bit at the people who complain about the house.

Noise. Not house!

There are people seriously affected by airplane noise. I am not so sure that people in Richmond and Hounslow are

The places that are seriously affected are in pockets and not where you would expect. Kew is dreadful - and not very close to Heathrow. I grew up in Teddington which is nearer to Heathrow and has next to no noise.

As for the poster who said that she wanted people in London to understand that it's not all about London - believe me, we know that. We don't actually want expansion of Heathrow - successive mayors of London have been very clear on that.

As discussed upthread, it's of no value to London to have random cargo arrive and refuel here on its way to elsewhere, or to have international business travellers stop off here on their longhaul flights. Income does not accrue to the UK through expansion of Heathrow. Jobs might grow - that's true - but we have a healthy work economy here anyway. These jobs would be much more beneficial to UK plc in another part of the UK.

I always thought there was actually quite a lot to be said for Boris island, if only because most of the noise would happen over sea.

Empress your arguments boggle my mind. Let me get this straight. Because you have not been bothered by aircraft noise on the odd occasion you have visited areas you feel are somewhat near the airport (though not necessarily beneath the flight path), you feel that nobody is/should be bothered by noise from aircraft landing/taking off from Heathrow. Is this correct?

Do you realise the scale of the noise people live with? I live 16 miles away from the airport, not right on its doorstep, but directly under one of the landing flight paths (having not been under it when we bought, until NATS arbitrarily decided every single plane should pass over our roof). We suffer 90-110 decibels of noise. Every 90 seconds. And that frequency is the peak noise frequency. Between those times the noise is increasing/fading, but is ever-present. There is never no noise. For 19 hours a day. Funnily enough, I actually need 8 hours sleep a night, so 5 hours off from the incessant cacophony just doesn't cut it.

If you think the noise isn't a problem, can I come round and park outside your home and play you 90-110 decibels of roaring plane engine, peaking every 90 seconds for 19 hours a day?

Oh and Backing is correct about the noise being in pockets and often way out from the airport. People in Putney are routinely woken by the noise and are unable to open windows or use their gardens in summer. Even as far away as Brixton people are being woken by it. It is that loud. And it is affecting almost a million people already.

If this is primarily a refuelling station then off-shore makes so much sense. Before Stansted became the 3rd London airport, Maplin Sands at the mouth of the Thames was often mooted as an alternative. As long as adequate habitats for wildlife are considered it makes more sense than Heathrow to me.

Estelle that sounds awful. Do you get used to the noise at all, or is it just too loud? I grew up on a main road and I found I didn't really notice the traffic noise when I lived there, but now I live somewhere much quieter and really notice cars going past.

Yes, an extra runway is needed, but why at Heathrow? Why not build it at Manchester, or Liverpool? The focus on the South East really irritates me. Especially when Manchester or Liverpool would welcome the extra runway.

It's actually worse to live further away from the airport but still on the flight path. We're under the flight path for Liverpool and we hear the planes more than my friend who lives about 2 minutes walk away. It's not loud enough to bother us, but I feel sorry for those who live near Heathrow - there's just no need for yet another runway.

Manchester and Liverpool airports both have ample room around them to have another runway and very few, if any, families would need to move for that to happen.

zad716

Except the 3rd runway is apparently going to be mostly for connecting flights and refueling. It's not for people coming to London at all really.

It's meant for those people that are flying (for example) to New York. If you're flying from Glasgow, you have to fly into Heathrow first and then catch your plane to New York. Why? Why not put that "hub" runway somewhere like Doncaster, Manchester, Leeds or Liverpool? Would provide more jobs in that area as well as take some of the focus from the south east. Manchester is a world-class airport and better than Heathrow, so why isn't it getting this runway? There's way too much of a focus on the South.

Would Manchester actually need another runway, or does it have excess capacity already?