Bristol airport expansion appeal approved
Posted: Wed Feb 02, 2022 11:14 pm
A bit of background. Bristol airport is the main regional airport for the south-west. It is at the top of a hill about 7 miles outside of Bristol on the edge of the mendips. It has a tendency to get covered in low cloud during warm front conditions and the short runway length (because it's at the top of a hill) means it is limited to short-haul flights.
There are no public transport links to the airport. There's a privately-run airport bus that runs between Bristol and the airport but that's it. Even locals can't get to the airport by public transport. You either get a (very expensive) taxis or take a car. And cars are charged to drop-off and pick-up passengers with no grace period at all (they used to give you 5 minutes, but that got scrapped a few years ago) so the vast majority of travellers (70% is the figure I've seen, one of the highest figures in the country) arrive by car, which then needs parking for the duration of their trip.
Passenger numbers were increasing before the pandemic but that increase was slowing, and with both the pandemic and brexit it's unclear how to forecast passenger numbers going forward. Despite this, the airport applied to expand to permit 12 million passengers per year, meaning an extra 23,800 flights including 4,000 night flights. They want to expand the terminal and parking area, claiming that it would bring economic benefits to the region. These claims are dubious given that the majority of travellers are flying out of the airport to go on holiday, not flying in to visit the region, and the majority of jobs on offer are low-pay shift work. The airport is owned by a Canadian pension fund so all its profits leave the country.
North Somerset Council rejected the application, against the advice of their planning officers, citing the negative local impacts of increased flights and people travelling to the airport as well as the climate implications (the Council having already voted to recognise a climate emergency and take steps to reduce the county's carbon emissions) - the expansion would completely negate any efforts made to bring to the region to carbon neutrality. Bath and North East Somerset Council also rejected the application, as did Bristol City Council and the West of England Combined Authority (WECA). The airport appealed the decision and it went to public enquiry.
Today
The inquiry gave its decision today. They decided to let the airport expand.
Their decision can be found here [PDF]. I've barely even skimmed it but I have to say what I've seen is based on a lot of assumptions that assume that everything will go back to being 'business as usual' after the pandemic, which I doubt. Why on earth would companies pay to fly you to Europe when they know that the vast majority of meetings can be done via Zoom for a fraction of the cost? I also see little reason to think that more people are going to be taking more overseas holidays than they have been pre-pandemic, especially considering the increased living costs we are all experiencing that reduces disposable income.
The most damning part of the report is its section on climate change, which is a bunch of waffle that reads to me like they're saying, 'yeah, we know the climate is changing and we're responsible but if we shift the carbon from this column to that one on the budget sheet we can make the airport's emissions disappear." It's an accounting trick, not a real response to a real crisis. They end the section by saying "Overall, this matter [climate change] must be regarded as neutral in the planning balance." Which is simply a stunning conclusion.
I am devastated by the decision. It shows a complete disregard for democracy - the local communities spoke and rejected the plan and the government has overturned that rejection. And it shows that the government has no intention to do anything about the climate crisis if it means harming profits (even if they're profits made for companies overseas). North Somerset Council is looking to see if there are grounds to contest the decision and I hope they find them.
There are no public transport links to the airport. There's a privately-run airport bus that runs between Bristol and the airport but that's it. Even locals can't get to the airport by public transport. You either get a (very expensive) taxis or take a car. And cars are charged to drop-off and pick-up passengers with no grace period at all (they used to give you 5 minutes, but that got scrapped a few years ago) so the vast majority of travellers (70% is the figure I've seen, one of the highest figures in the country) arrive by car, which then needs parking for the duration of their trip.
Passenger numbers were increasing before the pandemic but that increase was slowing, and with both the pandemic and brexit it's unclear how to forecast passenger numbers going forward. Despite this, the airport applied to expand to permit 12 million passengers per year, meaning an extra 23,800 flights including 4,000 night flights. They want to expand the terminal and parking area, claiming that it would bring economic benefits to the region. These claims are dubious given that the majority of travellers are flying out of the airport to go on holiday, not flying in to visit the region, and the majority of jobs on offer are low-pay shift work. The airport is owned by a Canadian pension fund so all its profits leave the country.
North Somerset Council rejected the application, against the advice of their planning officers, citing the negative local impacts of increased flights and people travelling to the airport as well as the climate implications (the Council having already voted to recognise a climate emergency and take steps to reduce the county's carbon emissions) - the expansion would completely negate any efforts made to bring to the region to carbon neutrality. Bath and North East Somerset Council also rejected the application, as did Bristol City Council and the West of England Combined Authority (WECA). The airport appealed the decision and it went to public enquiry.
Today
The inquiry gave its decision today. They decided to let the airport expand.
Their decision can be found here [PDF]. I've barely even skimmed it but I have to say what I've seen is based on a lot of assumptions that assume that everything will go back to being 'business as usual' after the pandemic, which I doubt. Why on earth would companies pay to fly you to Europe when they know that the vast majority of meetings can be done via Zoom for a fraction of the cost? I also see little reason to think that more people are going to be taking more overseas holidays than they have been pre-pandemic, especially considering the increased living costs we are all experiencing that reduces disposable income.
The most damning part of the report is its section on climate change, which is a bunch of waffle that reads to me like they're saying, 'yeah, we know the climate is changing and we're responsible but if we shift the carbon from this column to that one on the budget sheet we can make the airport's emissions disappear." It's an accounting trick, not a real response to a real crisis. They end the section by saying "Overall, this matter [climate change] must be regarded as neutral in the planning balance." Which is simply a stunning conclusion.
I am devastated by the decision. It shows a complete disregard for democracy - the local communities spoke and rejected the plan and the government has overturned that rejection. And it shows that the government has no intention to do anything about the climate crisis if it means harming profits (even if they're profits made for companies overseas). North Somerset Council is looking to see if there are grounds to contest the decision and I hope they find them.