Aidan Stanger wrote:
"nightjar" nightjar@insert_my_surname_here wrote:
"Oliver Keating" wrote...

The noise from Heathrow airport alone affects some 1 million people.

The majority of whom would have been born after it was built, so it
has been there longer than they have.

There are many exceptions (Her Majesty included) but I don't think
that's the point. Many more people would be inconvenienced by the
noise from an extra runway.

Actually the government yesterday imposed a very stringent limit on noise
at Heathrow which should have the effect of ensuring that more people are
*not* inconvenienced. Darling has committed to the 3rd runway being
conditional on the area of the 57 dBA noise contour being frozen at last
year's figure of 127 sq km.

The SERAS study claimed that a 3rd runway would expand the noise contour
area to more than 200 sg km; then last year's consultation paper decided
this was too pessimistic and predicted figures as low as 153 sq km, before
conceding grudgingly that it was just about possible to keep within the 145
sq km limit imposed by the conditions for building Terminal 5, even with 3
runways. Now the government says it must be not more than 127 sq km. I
think this may be more difficult to meet than the air quality limits.
--
Richard J.
(to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address)

"Aidan Stanger" wrote in message
...
Angus Bryant wrote:

This seems deeply concerning. If air traffic growth continues at it's
present rate, then in 50 years time air travel will account for 40% of
all
CO2 (greenhouse gas) emmissions.

And it's put directly into the upper atmosphere which has more of a
detrimental effect than if it were released at ground level.

I've heard this claim an awful lot, but not an explanation as to why.
What effect does CO2 have in the upper atmosphere that it does not have
at ground level?

Try this (esp. section 3.43)

http://www.aet.org.uk/PDFs/RCEP%20Ai...n%20flight.pdf

Angus

..

There is no "need" to have massive expansion in air travel, most expansion
comes from people going on budget holidays, i.e. things that are not
essential for the general operation of our society.


If you mean Budget Holidays as in the expanison of budget airlines
flying from airports. Business travellers are tending to go more by
budget airlines. Why should a business pay three times the amount just
so its middle manager can have a leather seat and a cup of tea for
free on their one hour flight?
And the other big growth that has helped budget airlines has been the
growth in number of people with second homes in Spain and France
flying there for the weekend.
Whilist I would agree rich people sipping red wine in their second
homes should be forced to sell the home and give the money to homeless
people. I think that budget holidays are essential. Poor people should
be allowed to travel aboard too. Have you ever been to Cleethorpes and
Scarborough? You can see why us poor folk would rather leave the
country than go there. Lots of things are not essential for the
general opreation of society. i.e alcohol. Try banning that. But think
about the benefit to society. Instead of saying lets rise prices so
only rich people can fly. Lets embrace the fact that more and more
people can fly. The world is getting smaller. Lets celebrate it.
Especially today. Celebration of 100 years flight and that (unless you
read the Guardian and then your belive flight was invented by a
Brazilan)

"Aidan Stanger" wrote in message
...
Angus Bryant wrote:

This seems deeply concerning. If air traffic growth continues at it's
present rate, then in 50 years time air travel will account for 40% of
all
CO2 (greenhouse gas) emmissions.

And it's put directly into the upper atmosphere which has more of a
detrimental effect than if it were released at ground level.

I've heard this claim an awful lot, but not an explanation as to why.
What effect does CO2 have in the upper atmosphere that it does not have
at ground level?

The green house effect is caused by CO2 in the upper atmosphere bouncing
back infra-red radiation to the earth.

The fact is, incoming radiation from the sun is high frequency because the
sun is very hot. CO2 is transparant to high frequency radiation.

The Earth is much cooler, so it emits low-frequency radiation, which CO2
absorbs and reflects - hence greenhouse.

CO2 at ground level has little effect, but in the upper atmosphere its where
it really has it's effects. So in theory, a pollution source that puts CO2
straight up there, rather than at ground level will do more harm.

The argument is slightly spurious because atmospheric gases have an
excellent mixing coefficient, and any local high concerntrations of CO2 will
be rapidly mixed until the concerntration is nearly uniform - indeed recent
analysis found that the concerntration of CO2 was extremely constant around
the world.

"nightjar .uk.com" nightjar@insert_my_surname_here wrote in message
...

"Oliver Keating" wrote in message
...
So, massive expansion planned for Heathrow, Stanstead and Luton:

One new runway for the least useful airport for the bulk of the population
of SE England is hardly a massive expansion. Luton gets to use its current
ruwnay a bit more and Heathrow might get a new runway, if it can meet
pollution levels that it cannot achieve with the current ones.

Considering there are less than ten runways in the SE, one extra one is
quite significant.

But also there was talk of Heathrow terminal 6 (!) and a third one.
Basically expansion across the board, except for Gatwick.

This seems deeply concerning. If air traffic growth continues at it's
present rate, then in 50 years time air travel will account for 40% of
all
CO2 (greenhouse gas) emmissions.

These minor expansions will not give anywhere near the capacity to achieve
that sort of level of growth.

Admittedtly the USA is responsible for much of this, but even so, air travel
is the fastest growing source of CO2 emmissions, and that is something
everyone should be concerned by.

The noise from Heathrow airport alone affects some 1 million people.

The majority of whom would have been born after it was built, so it has
been
there longer than they have.

I really doubt that. Heathrow effects much of west London, the noise may not
be as unbearable as right next door, but it is still there.

There is no "need" to have massive expansion in air travel, most
expansion
comes from people going on budget holidays, i.e. things that are not
essential for the general operation of our society.

A lot of people would argue that holidays are essential for the successful
operation of our society. However, according to Newsnight, the main growth
area is now in the middle-to-high income bracket travellers.

This is dubious. 50 years ago hardly anyone went abroad to go on holiday,
and we got on fine then.

Besides, I am sure lots of these business meetings could make better use of
telecommunications. Now I know they are not a substitute for being there,
but they could be used on more occasions.

...
As far as I can see, being able to go on holiday twice a year instead of
once is nice, but the environmental damage is a price that is not worth
paying.

Nobody is forcing you to take two holidays a year if you think that, but I
will continue to take my usual three and I have a target of at least one
long weekend in France each month as well.

My personal view is that it is a pity that Gatwick did not get another
runway and that the RAF never finished Heathrow's nine runways before they
handed it over.

I find people who claim not be green quite amusing. By ignoring the problems
they somehow feel immune to the situation, or worse yet, simply deny any
problem exists because they are unable to face the truth.

Colin Bignell

"MrBitsy" wrote in message
...
Aidan Stanger wrote:

snip

Another runway would have serious safety implications if there's a
missed approach on the center runway.

Rubbish!

They currently use one for takeoffs and one for landings - how would the
situation be any worse with a third runway?


At present if an a/c taking off need to divert suddenly they simply turn
away from the other runway's flight path.

If you have three working in parallel where doe the middle one go?

Cast_Iron wrote:
"MrBitsy" wrote in message
...
Aidan Stanger wrote:

snip

Another runway would have serious safety implications if there's a
missed approach on the center runway.

Rubbish!

They currently use one for takeoffs and one for landings - how would
the situation be any worse with a third runway?


At present if an a/c taking off need to divert suddenly they simply
turn away from the other runway's flight path.

If you have three working in parallel where doe the middle one go?

The issue is not about a/c "needing to divert suddenly" but needing to go
around for another approach to land. If both the other runways have a/c
taking off at the time, I guess the middle a/c would fly straight ahead
until it was safe to turn under one of the other take-off paths. It makes
the circuit a bit longer, that's all. Presumably the problem has been
solved at Paris CDG and other multi-runway airports.
--
Richard J.
(to e-mail me, swap uk and yon in address)

On Wed, 17 Dec 2003 08:01:22 +0000, Steve Peake
wrote:

How could I have guessed that a 3rd runway was on the
cards, especially when the 5th terminal inspector placed a flight cap on
the airport?

perhaps because the plans for the third runway were drawn up years ago.
It didn't take a rocket scientist to anticipate that one day there was a
chance they might come to something.


--
Lansbury
www.uk-air.net
FAQs for the alt.travel.uk.air newsgroup

"Oliver Keating" wrote in message
...
So, massive expansion planned for Heathrow, Stanstead and Luton:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3322277.stm

This seems deeply concerning. If air traffic growth continues at it's
present rate, then in 50 years time air travel will account for 40% of all
CO2 (greenhouse gas) emmissions.

sinp

Luddites like you will put millions on the dole queue.

"CJG Now Thankfully Living In The North" wrote in
message om...
.

There is no "need" to have massive expansion in air travel, most
expansion
comes from people going on budget holidays, i.e. things that are not
essential for the general operation of our society.


If you mean Budget Holidays as in the expanison of budget airlines
flying from airports. Business travellers are tending to go more by
budget airlines. Why should a business pay three times the amount just
so its middle manager can have a leather seat and a cup of tea for
free on their one hour flight?

To be honest, I am not sure quite a lot of these meetings have any value at
all. The managers fly out there, stay in an expensive hotel, then meet for
about an hour and have a chat which usually doesn't actually do anything
productive and ends with "i'll e-mail you with the details and we can take
it from there". Great, could have done that in the first place.

And the other big growth that has helped budget airlines has been the
growth in number of people with second homes in Spain and France
flying there for the weekend.
Whilist I would agree rich people sipping red wine in their second
homes should be forced to sell the home and give the money to homeless
people. I think that budget holidays are essential. Poor people should
be allowed to travel aboard too. Have you ever been to Cleethorpes and
Scarborough? You can see why us poor folk would rather leave the
country than go there. Lots of things are not essential for the
general opreation of society. i.e alcohol. Try banning that. But think
about the benefit to society. Instead of saying lets rise prices so
only rich people can fly. Lets embrace the fact that more and more
people can fly. The world is getting smaller. Lets celebrate it.
Especially today. Celebration of 100 years flight and that (unless you
read the Guardian and then your belive flight was invented by a
Brazilan)

Celebrate the world by destorying it? The problem is like this: air travel
causes a lot of pollution, and we have to ask the question of how to we
ensure that all those trips are absolutely necessary?

Well, the only method that we can be sure works is by price. A high price
will force users to judge how necessary their flight is. Just look at the
drop in traffic after congestion traffic, all of these journeys that were
"absolutely essential" or "could not be made any other way" were obvious not
essential enough to warrant £5 expenditure.

Yes pricing the poor out of the skies is a social injustice, but it could be
argued that is merely caused by the ever widening gap between rich and poor
in this country - a totally seperate issue!