Carriers take Whitehall to court over noise limits at airports
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Your support makes all the difference.Government proposals to turn Heathrow into the quietest major airport in the world are to be challenged by carriers. Randeep Ramesh, Transport Correspondent, reports on the battle to keep Britain's skies quiet.
The world's biggest airlines announced a High Court challenge yesterday against tough new government noise limits for aircraft leaving from Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted airports.
Robert Ayling, the chief executive of British Airways, has already warned ministers that the controversial proposed limits would cost the flag carrier pounds 230m a year - a third of its profits.
According to the directors of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the moves would see Paris and Madrid replacing Heathrow as London's main international airport. Last year Heathrow handled more than 56 million passengers in 12 months.
"We have been to see ministers in Europe and they have listened. The British government were completely unsympathetic," said William Gaillard, a director of IATA. Mr Gaillard said that IATA lawyers would be seeking leave for a judicial review of the Government's proposals later this week.
The new limits, put forward in a consultation paper last November, would force passenger jets to be at least three decibels quieter than at present during the day, and only emit 87 decibels at night.
"It is technically unfeasible," said Mr Gaillard. "No plane can meet these targets - not even the latest jets."
Mr Gaillard added that the lower limits would rule out many airlines' most profitable services - which see jets leaving fully loaded from Heathrow to destinations in Asia and South America.
IATA says that airlines will instead divert aircraft to European capitals and then see passengers taking smaller, quieter planes to London.
"There is plenty of space at other European hubs. Madrid has the go-ahead for five runways and Paris for four," said Mr Gaillard.
Airlines have already delayed the introduction of the limits, which were first proposed in 1996. In April last year, IATA won a high court case which forced ministers to reconsider their original plans.
But despite vigorous lobbying from Mr Ayling, who advises the Government on the Millennium Dome and who is personally close to the Prime Minister, transport ministers have refused to budge. The industry has pointed out that the only aircraft which could meet the new limits are the latest Boeing 777s - which currently ferry passengers to the Caribbean and the Middle East.
"These limits would mean that aircraft like the jumbo [Boeing 747] would be unsuitable to fly with the current passenger numbers they carry," said Max Kingsley-Jones, commercial aviation editor of Flight Magazine.
The Government remains unmoved. "Our position has not changed from the previous government's," said a spokesman for the Department of the Environment.
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