City Council approve Carlisle Airport expansion plans

At a special planning meeting today of Carlisle City Council’s Development Control Committee, plans for a £25m expansion of Carlisle Airport, which could see passenger flights to London operating by 2009 were approved in principle subject to conditions*.  The plans include building a new runway, control tower and hangars, with a view to launching the airport's first commercial services.

CLICK HERE to view more information about the planning application.

(* The Development Control Committee are unable to formally approve the planning application as the expansion plans do not fall within the "admitted development" for the area and the application will have to be approved formally by central government. A further meeting of the Development Control Committee to discuss and agree the conditions will take place on Friday, 4th April.)

Airport owner, Andrew Tinkler, also wants to move his haulage firm Eddie Stobart and engineering company WA Developments to the site, with plans to develop an air freight terminal.

• The development has enormous capacity to generate vehicle and aircraft movements, not described in the application.
• Used to anything like its full capacity, the development will have major adverse environmental impacts.
• It will increase greenhouse gas emissions from the area, contradicting the Community Plan commitment to become one of the least emitting local authority areas.
• It contradicts the Council’s stated aspiration to create a “cleaner and greener” Carlisle.
• It will damage the viability of the west coast main line rail service if the passenger terminal is successful.
• The flight paths on the re-orientated runway are shown in the application to pass directly over urban Brampton, and Carlisle, causing additional noise and pollution.
• The airport lease condition allowing hourly night time flights risks being taken up by the potential for a massive international freight facility.
• It will introduce noise and damage to the natural environment of an area very close to Hadrian’s Wall.

The group also feels that on top of all this complexity and uncertainty, there has been no proper public consideration of the issues raised, merely a couple of short-duration, short-notice meetings fronted by the developers themselves and that the Council should be taking the lead in facilitating this process further.

Bob Allan, Secretary of Sustainable Brampton had the following to say:-

“The application is very complicated and makes it very difficult to understand the developer’s intentions. There appears to be the capacity to handle huge numbers of lorries and freight as part of a massive air-road freight terminal on a potentially international scale, with the potential for hourly night time flights.

“This is no way to take Carlisle into the 21^st century. It will seriously damage the area’s reputation, spoil its general environment, will be a complete contradiction of the Council’s stated intention to make the area “greener and cleaner”, and will further damage its ability to meet its stated target of being one of the best Council areas in the country for greenhouse gas emissions.

“This issue needs wise leadership and a strong nerve - the Development Control Committee needs to demonstrate those qualities when it meets 28 March. A decision with such potential consequences should at least be preceded by a full public inquiry”.

Contact:
Bob Allan, Secretary, Sustainable Brampton
Tel: 016977 3111
Email: r.n.allan@btinternet.com
Website: www.sustainablebrampton.org