London neighbourhoods without jet noise?

[eversomuch]

Do they exist? Have lived in North and West London and everywhere we go, we hear planes. DD (3yo) says at night she opens her eyes every time one flies over and closes them once they've passed. I don't want this to be normal for her!

I've looked at the flight path maps that Heathrow publishes and it looks like every area we'd consider is in the flight path. Seriously considering looking outside London now, if we could find a nice community within commuting distance.

The whole "you get used to it" approach doesn't work for us, btw, It's been several years and we still notice planes that no one else seems to hear. Blessed with extra good hearing, I suppose! But I'd rather hear owls.

I've lived in northwest and now southeast, can't say it bothers me that much. Now whether that's to do with there not being much air traffic or I'm used to it I don't know!

We did use to have Concorde, which obviously I did notice but that was pretty amazing at the same time.

Hampton Court/Molesey do you? Occasional noise but not regularly.

but new runways planned, it will only get worse...

Kensington. Strangely the most expensive part of London doesn't seem to suffer.

I'd rather hear owls too.......what I don't hear is the planes, and I live in Ealing.

what I do hear are the foxes, cats, dogs, birdies twittering very bloody loudly at sunrise, the buses at 5am, party revelers at all hours, honking horns, car alarms, house alarms. but I am a particularly rubbish sleeper.

I have friends, who live so far underneath the Heathrow flight path they could wave to the pilot, who's dc (and them) sleep soundly every night because it's the norm

you want a London suburb that's quiet and free from any noise good luck

I'm apparently hyper-sensitive to them and notice them before anyone else. I feel like Radar from MAS*H. And DD seems very sensitive to them too.

Kensington def not an option.

Loved Ealing but had planes right overhead much of the time.

Would have thought Hampton Court area already affected. We pretty much ruled all of west London out because of the constant risk of increased air traffic, new runways, etc.

I am in LB Bromley, and we rarely hear aeroplanes. Except for the Biggin Hill airshow.

I should add that I don't expect silence. I recognize this it's a big city and big city noise comes with it. But the constant hum and often very intrusive plane noise is really getting to me.

I only hear the planes if I happen to be awake in the very early morning (jumbos which come in from the far east at 5-6am and they do seem loud then). Are the planes that loud at all other times of the day? They don't even register with me!

Ditto Bromley. It depends in the scheduling of the gatwick flight paths, but not v often. I can hear one now, the first this pm. Depends also on direction of wind. Nothing like central it west London.

Bloody foxes, however. And owls. And duck. And Canada Geese. And the crows. And Heron and the occasional party. And alarms.

Be careful what you wish for.

does depend on the part of Ealing. we only have them when the runways change, prob twice a month or if the wind is in the wrong direction.

I used to live in W Hampstead. Not much in the way of plane noise at all that I noticed.

If you want to hear owls, you might want to live somewhere other than a massive city though

No aircraft noise where I am (C London) and have never noticed any where my family lives (Camden). Grew up near Kingston and never heard much there either (very occasionally and also when concord went over but obviously that was rare and also no longer relevant).

But if it's a big issue for you I would move out. It would be awful to find a silent spot and then find they've changed the flight path. Also, where I am, no aircraft but millions of roadworks (often through the night so as to minimise disturbance to traffic ). Previous place (1 mile away) no aircraft but a bit of a problem with police helicopters.

Currently there is hardly any plane noise at all in Kingston, Surbiton, Thames Ditton, Esher etc. Richmond, St Margarets, Kew and Isleworth should be struck off your list right now - all awful for the roar of the jet engine at 530am...

I regularly hear owls and not much else from my window at night. Don't give up hope.

the issue of the extra runways won't ever go away until they are built - and then they will start planning more.

Even the Queen lives on a flight path! I also remember my last visit to Kew, horrific.

the areas headache mentions are near Molesey. We had the odd days when we thought 'hmm, planes today' but that tells you they were the exception. No real disturbance since Concorde was grounded - and never minded that, once a day and spectacular!

Yep Kew is awful. It's odd though - neighbouring towns are fine. Teddington, Kingston all fine.

Do you have to stay west? We're in SE London and only get plane noise when the Biggin Hill holding pattern is in use and to be honest, they're so high that we barely notice it. It's extremely intermittent and certainly less noisy than a police siren or a boy racer. I grew up in Barnes, Concorde's wheels used to come down over our house, and it's nothing like that.

We lived in Clapham for a while and DH hated it. He was woken every morning by the trans-atlantic flights. Having grown up with it, I got used to it again fairly quickly but agree it's not pleasant.

I live in Greenwich and there is occasional noise from City Airport if there is heavy cloud and wind in wrong direction but they only have small aircraft there and no prospect of additional runways.

I see planes going over us in Crystal Palace but never hear them, whereas when we lived a couple of miles further south in Norbury I heard them often (though it didn't bother me), so presumably the planes are higher by the time they're in CP and inaudible (layman's deduction!). Anyway, the point being there's no aircraft noise here that I'm aware of and it's a lovely place to live too.