Send email today to oppose Bristol Airport expansion

It is clear that 2010 is going to be a busy time for those of us opposing the expansion of Bristol International Airport. In December BIA put out a large raft of changes to its plans, with a consultation period covering the Christmas holidays and closing on the 5th January. However since people haven't had a proper chance to respond, North Somersert Council has agreed to accept comments after the closing date.

It would be really helpful if folk opposing this expansion could make their views known as soon as possible. Just click the link below and cut and paste (and edit as appropriate) the following text then mailto:
dccomments@n-somerset.gov.uk?subject=objection-amendments-09/P/1020/OT2

Dear Sir I would like to object to the planning application 09/P/1020/OT2 as amended on 16th December 2009. The amendments make little material difference to the impacts to which I previously objected because: 1) There is no cap on passenger numbers or flight movements and from the planning application the airport can grow to at least 13.8 mppa if not 15 mppa. The Chief Executive, Robert Sinclair states that the figure of 10 mppa will be reached according to economic conditions and not whether infrastructure or environmental targets are met. Therefore I ask for the application to be turned down, and failing that for a cap of 8 million passengers per year, with no further growth until road and transport improvments can be guaranteed. 2) Traffic: Although BIA has offered to increase funding for public infrastructure, from £3m to £5.4m, the road improvements are largely irrelevant to the problems of congestion around the airport and through the neighbouring villages. At the time NS Council take a decision on this application, no-one will know for certain if central Government funding will be available for the South Bristol Link and the Bus Rapid Transit. The improvements to public transport are minor and will not avoid an extra 2m car journeys per year to the airport. The vast majority of passengers will still travel by car. 3) Night flights: Despite proposing a lower cap on night flights, BIA has plans for a significant increase in the number of night flights, 25% above 2008 levels. There will be no reduction in the noise experienced by residents. I am asking for a cap in night flight movements of a maximum 2500 per year, a defined 8 hour night flight period, and a review of night flying policy every two years with the aim of progressively reducing the night flying nuisance. 4) We believe the Green Belt is still under threat as BIA are not making a genuine concession - they are just proposing 'phased' development until they have enough extra cars to fill that set of fields. 5) The climate change impacts remain the same, with a huge rise in emissions planned just when everyone else is meant to be cutting emissions. 6) The number of jobs BIA claims it will generate is inaccurate because they are largely based on inbound tourism and ignore the damage done to the SW tourist industry by outbound tourists. 7) As the airport only handled 5.6m passengers in the last 12 months, below the level seen in 2006, it is totally unnecessary to increase capacity to 10m passengers. I remain opposed to this development Yours faithfully