Bristol Airport: 6 weeks to tell North Somerset council why this expansion is not needed

bristol | transport | news report Tuesday June 30, 2009 11:49 by fw

Stop BIA!

Bristol International Airport (BIA) has applied for planning permission to expand. This development aims to increase passengers by 60% by 2016, increase passenger flights by 40%, summer night flights by 50%, car journeys by over 2m per year, and carbon emissions by at least 40%. Time to stop the carbon-expansion madness!

This will mean more traffic on country roads, more noise day and night, more countryside eaten up by car parking, and more climate changing impacts.

It is argued that expansion will be good for tourism, but between 6 and 10 times as many tourists are outbound rather than inbound, leading to £700m being drained from the UK economy each year. Expansion will make this worse. Recently, the weak pound has caused passenger numbers to drop by 15% or more, but local tourist destinations have seen more visitors than last year.

BIA claim that expansion will create 3500 jobs in the region, but only 900 of these are within the airport and the rest of the jobs appear to be wishful thinking. The outflow of tourism spending destroys far more jobs than this. Even 800 jobs looks high when the expansion is based on no-frills airlines.

Business passengers can already use BIA to reach anywhere in the world through Paris, Amsterdam and Newark. Expansion would not bring any significant change to this, it is targeted at outbound tourists.

We have 6 weeks to tell North Somerset council why this expansion is not needed, and why it is bad for the economy as well as the environment.

You can object to the expansion in the following ways:
1) you can visit our website and use the email form www.stopbia.com/objection.php

2) you can email the council yourself at dccomments@n-somerset.gov.uk, refering to planning application number 09/P/1020/OT2, please copy your email to email@stopbia.com

3) write a letter to
Neil Underhay, re: application 09/P/1020/OT2
Development Control
North Somerset Council
Somerset House
Oxford Road
Weston super Mare
BS23 1TG

You can also help us in the following ways:
1) forward this email to any people you think may be interested
2) help to distribute printed leaflets (please contact email@stopbia.com)
3) make a donation at www.stopbia.com/donate.php

You can find lots more details on what BIA are planning to do, and why we believe the impacts far outweigh the benefits by visiting our website: http://www.stopbia.com

You can find what the airport says about its plans here:
http://www.bristolairport.co.uk/about_us/our_future/pla....aspx