Here is the documentation published today http://www.thanet.gov.uk/council__democracy/consultation/night-time_flying_policy.aspxUpdate I have published the files in ordinary html at http://www.thanetonline.com/nightflights/
More about this if I get time later on.
It may take a bit longer than I thought as the council have published the information as locked pdf files only, my ancient laptop can hardly open them let alone unlock them, so that I can paste the most relevant bits into this blog post.
Investment, jobs, increased revenue, uptake of more airlines, improved destinations, more choice, more jobs, more investment in local businesses, development of china gateway, even more job generated by new investors..all looks good to me and cetainly worth building the new road, might even get a new railway station too. So there's a bit of disturbance, my guess is no louder than the A10 tank busters and other military jets that regularly flew in to manston whenever they felt like it...this could be the making of Thanet!
ReplyDeleteWhat a good publication from the council. Surely this is how important applications should be publicised. What a pity this approach doesn't extend to such matters as lease negotiations on heritage properties. I wonder why!
ReplyDeleteThis page will soon be packed with posts from the anti brigade. "We don't want noisy jets 24/7" which is certainly not the intention of these proposals.
ReplyDeleteif the intention of the proposal is to not allow 24/7 flights, then why is it asking for it, why is the chief exec on radio today saying night flights are necessary?
ReplyDeleteThe airport has asked for the ability to SCHEDULE 747's at 3am without penalty if they so wish. 7 days a week, 365 days a year. They can couple this with a 2am flight and a 4 am flight if they so wish.
Read the request with your eyes open next time.
Realistically there isn't the freight to fly every night is there! No carrier has that much produce to bring in here, so yes maybe a few a week at most. Certainly not a flight at 3am every single day.
ReplyDeleteWon't be long before the 'whingers' get on here,, lets put it to a vote across thanet, Hopefully we can out vote the Ramsgate Nimbys
ReplyDeleteBUILD ON THE WHOLE GOD DAMN SITE...TREES, ENTERTAINMENT VENUES, ICE RINKS, MUSEUMS - - HELLO IT WAS AN RAF BASE NOT A COMMERCIAL RUNWAY - - PLUS THE ORIENTATION AND LOCATION WAS DUE TO THE WARS!!! AND FOR THOSE WHO SAY THAT THE AIRPORT WAS THERE WHEN THEY BOUGHT THEIR PROPERTY - YOU HAVE A ROAD OUTSIDE YOUR PROPERTY BUT YOU WOULDN'T WANT IT TO BECOME A SIX LANE MOTORWAY WOULD YOU? SURELY ITS AGAINST OUR HUMAN RIGHTS TO NOT HAVE ANY SLEEP!
ReplyDeleteTHE ONLY PEOPLE THAT ARE FOR IT LIVE MILES FROM IT (SANDWICH OR BROADSTAIRS) OR ARE TOTALLY DEAF OR ARE COUNCILORS! I'M ALRIGHT SOD THE REST! SHALL WE GO AROUND WITH A CARNIVAL FLOAT AND A BLASTING LOUD SPEAKER WITH A PLANE ENGINE AND DRIVE AROUND YOUR AREA! SEE HOW YOU LIKE-
14:53 Caps lock is situated to the left of your keyboard. I used to live in Ramsgate when it was an Air Force site and some of the planes were extremely loud for a few minutes and then they either few away or landed. Sometimes they flew around all night with spotlights on doing silly practices. Never stopped me sleeping or my wife or my two kids. Yes my present house was built in the 1930's and in those days had two cars a day go by. Things are different now its 2010, unfortunately people want Health and Safety assessments to boil a kettle and wish too blame someone for everything. The people who blame the airport for having noisy aircraft flying from it must have had an idea that the big bad airport would possibly want to fly big bad air planes from it.
ReplyDeleteFULL CAPS HAD TO BE USED TO BE HEARD OVER THE AIRCRAFT NOISE!
ReplyDeleteOhhhhh what a shame I moved to Margate LOL
ReplyDeleteSadly, Thanet is full of very selfish people who have no sense of community and no consideration for their neighbours. This is one of the reasons the area fails to attract decent businesses and professional workers. The people who are likely to be afected by these proposals deserve understanding and empathy. What they don't need is some twit in a baseball cap telling them that there was an airport there before they were born and so, they will just have to lump it.
ReplyDeleteFortunately, there are legal avenues to challenge this nonsense. I hear lawyers are queuing up to take this one on.
Ranting doesn't help anyone Anonymous 14:53, most tend to ignore it. I will however put you right on a couple of points. The only people who are for it don't live miles from it. I live directly under the flight path and I'm for it. I've lived here for over 50 years and can remember when there were no cars to be seen in the street. Today there are cars parked everywhere and traffic cause me far more annoyance than the aircraft. However, most of the traffic is caused by people working. If we want to maintain our standard of living we need to work to pay for it. To work we need jobs, and jobs come from commercial activity. Don't let's kill the goose that lays the golden egg.
ReplyDeleteI'm confident that there are legal procedures to determine what is necessary and acceptable to the whole community, not just those that do or don't want it. My only concern is to see that the council carries out it's duties and responsibilities in an open and honest manner.
17:14 ANON its got to be somebody's fault a blame game again. Listen to yourself, you live in a culture of compensation so someone has to be at fault. Get real if you buy a house by an airport you get planes buy one by a motorway you get cars it aint rocket science and as for baseball caps I am sure you wear yours with pride. As for understanding and empathy. I understand we have a under used resource and I am sure the owners of it deserve our empathy as much as those who are affected by any increase in traffic.
ReplyDeleteUnder The Runway well said. I started my reply and went to eat my tea and your post came in before I posted. I agree with your last comments about legal procedure and the council.
ReplyDeleteDon’t know how anyone else is getting on unscrambling the various pdf files.
ReplyDeleteI have been trying to work out what the airport is asking for in simple terms, I think it means that they want the unrestricted daytime period extended from 7 in the morning to 6 in the morning and at nighttime from 11 to 11.30.
I also think it means an average of 3 night flights between 11.30 at night and 6 in the morning in 24 hours.
It also seems to be saying that fines for failure to comply i.e extra night flights or night flights involving very loud aircraft, will be £1,000 for night flights taking off and landing over Ramsgate and 500 for flights taking off and landing away from Ramsgate.
They also seem to say that the night flights will be mainly taking off and landing away from Ramsgate
Why don't the nutters who moved near to an airport move to florida and watch the space shuttles take off? Ther are 135,000 folk in thanet,, lets ask them all how we should regard the twerps who bought a house under the flight path of an air port and now want peace and quiet??? sounds like a no brainer to me
ReplyDeleteSo its my fault for living many years in Ramsgate, by that stupid line of thinking if your neighbours dog tears your arse off its your fault for moving next to someone who cannot control his dog
ReplyDeleteStargazer.
Stargazer, it’s not necessarily a foregone conclusion that a neighbour’s dog will tear a lump out your arse, but it’s a fairly good bet that aircraft will use an airfield.
ReplyDeleteAirports like rabid dogs should be kept under control,
ReplyDeleteStargazer
Stargazers, like other loonies should be kept in secure places, not under care in the community
ReplyDeleteHere's what the airport is asking for:
ReplyDeleteThe agreement only deals with scheduled night-flights. They are currently allowed to have any number of unscheduled (ad hoc) flights at night and they will continue to be able to have these. The document presented to the Council covers what they want IN ADDITION to what is already permitted.
Between 2330 and 0600 they want to have an allowance for the number and type of planes that can fly in an out of the airport. They are asking for a quota count of 1995 per year. A jumbo jet is, generally, quota count 4. If all of the flights were Jumbo jets they could have 500 per year.
It isn't wuite as simple as this because the quota count of an aircraft is an individual noise rating. It depends on a range of factors. Different models of thesame plane can have different quota counts. The same model of the same plane can have different quota counts depending on the engines. Some aircraft are quota count 4 when they are taking off and 2 when they are landing. The quota count system is horribly complicated and the only way the Council would know the quota count of an aircraft would be by asking Infratil to tell them.
By today's standards, Jumbo jets are pretty noisy. The more modern jets (e.g. MD11 or Airbus) are QC2 or less. They could have 1000 QC2 aircraft per year, or 2000 QC1 aircraft (one every hour throughout the night). It would be a mistake to believe that QC1 aircraft are in any way "quiet."
All of this could use the airport without penalty. One of the key failing of the document is that it doesn't specify what they would have to pay if they went over 1995 in a year. For that matter, it doesn't specify when the year starts and finishes.
The whole document is a nonsense because it doesn't deal with how it would be enforced andwhat penalties would apply for failure to comply. This is one of the key failings of the curent Section 206 Agreement and the Infratil are clearly trying the same trick again.
Infratil are going to pay nothing for the priviledge of having night-flights. At other airports the airport operator has to pay large sums of money into the communities they blight with their activities. This proposal contains not one penny for the residents who will have to suffer from this activity.
They say that they will not allow scheduled flights by aircraft which are greater than quota count 4. However, this is not much of a concession because there is very little left flying in Europe that is greater than quota count 4.
If something that is greater than quota count 4 were to use the airport at night there would be a fine of £1000. This fine is not large enough to be a deterrent. The Section 106 Agreement, which currently regulates the airport, was drawn up in 2002. It contains fines of £1000 and they've been happily paying them since 2002.
The bit that is missing from the published document is what they plan to do between 2300 and 2330 at night and between 0600 and 0700. The information is in a consultants report from Bikerdike Allen which leaked from the Council last week. In these 'shoulder periods' they are planning to fly in and out the same numbers of aircraft they are planning to fly in and out during the night. These flights will be taking place at night but they won't count towards the quota. They are free to increase flights during the 'shoulder periods' to any level they want. There are no penalties and no limits.
What is critical with this document is that TDC does a best and worst case scenario. It is the worst case scenario that will shock everyone.
No increase in flight numbers should be allowed until Infratil demonstrates full, independently monitered, compliance with safety zones and pollution monitoring.
ReplyDelete(Oh! and the runway is realigned with Cecil Street, Margate:-)
If we are woken up by a quiet plane or a noisy plane,wichever way they camouflage it,and try to kid people,especially our councilors with all the noise figures it is night flights and there is no getting away from that fact.I think we are about to waste thousands of pounds just so that Infratill can boast we are open all hours,as Chuchill said you can fool some of the people some of the time but not all of the people all of the time.
ReplyDeleteStargazer.
Planes coming into Manston fly directly over my house. Every time I hear an incoming my whole body tenses with fear. The route to the runway is directly over Ramsgate town, so in addition to the shipping pollution blown in from Dover, we now have to contend with the aircraft pollution dumped on us by moneygrabbing tyrants who do not have to suffer the inconvenience.
ReplyDeleteI understand the concerns of the Ramsgate resident about flight noise. Surely though the ‘suits’ in charge of this ‘fob off the revolting peasantry’ exercise can amend the flight paths away from urban areas?
ReplyDeleteAside from noise it has got to be a good idea to upgrade Manston as it is the next logical London airport due to proximity, and transport links. And we in Thanet would benefit from schemes like the light rail proposals on back of airport enhancements?
Clearly night flights are a nono in almost all circumstances. However we also need an acceptable definition of ‘night’ – mine= 23.00-08.00. And weekend = Fri. 23.00-Mon. 08.00 etc….
The news that someone wants to invest in Thanet is great news. I'm sure no one is challenging that. The Airport is fantastic opportunity for everyone in Thanet. However. Flight paths are the main concern here. Alot of Money will be spent on noise pollution. How ever you dress the report it will cause irreversible damage the Ramsgate. Investors will leave and the town which is no way to go. - Why are the authorizes not looking into surveying the site to change flight paths? its a simple matter that im sure could be resolved. - in respect can someone point me in the right direction to investigate further as I love Ramsgate but im afraid that i might have to look else where for a bit of paradise
ReplyDeletepete.howe@talk21.com
The news that someone wants to invest in Thanet is great news. I'm sure no one is challenging that. The Airport is fantastic opportunity for everyone in Thanet. However- Flight paths are the main concern here. Alot of Money will be spent on noise pollution. How ever you dress the report it will cause irreversible damage the Ramsgate. Investors will leave the town which is no way to go. - Why are the authorities not looking into surveying the site to change flight paths? its a matter that im sure could be resolved with changing the way those plans fly over the town. - in respect can someone point me in the right direction to investigate further as I love Ramsgate but im afraid that i might have to look else where for a bit of paradise
ReplyDeletepete.howe@talk21.com