Re: The most amazing engineering
I moved to Maidenhead 15 years ago. As pledges go, David Cameron's in 2009 was unequivocal: he said that a Conservative government would not build a third runway at Heathrow. For the avoidance of any doubt, he added: 'No ifs, no buts'.
Heathrow flights are capped at 480K per year – which was set as a condition of the Terminal 5 planning consent in 2001. Once runway 3 is in operation the number of flights (air transport movements or ATMs) will be 702K in mixed mode, which is an increase of 46% and means that alternating mode, (the current system where residents under the flight paths get a break for half the day) will be binned.
It is reasonable to think that a restriction on flight numbers critical to the granting of planning consent for a new very large terminal at Heathrow would be meaningful for at least two decades. And one would expect that an unequivocal statement by a PM would bind future governments, particularly those of the same party, for at least several decades. Clearly neither is accurate. And one cannot escape the conclusions that BA always intended to get runway 3 built once consent for T5 was given and that Theresa May's government considers David Cameron's commitment given 9 years ago not to allow runway 3 counts for nought.
To the person who wrote that 'it amuses him / her when people move next to an airport then complain about the noise': nice. You keep smiling, amused person.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
