Stop Stansted Expansion
The Wilderness Foundation UK has pledged to support the Stop Stansted Expansion group in Essex.
Airport operator BAA and its Spanish owners Ferrovial want to make Stansted Airport bigger than Heathrow today by expanding the use of its single runway and constructing a second runway within an enlarged airport perimeter.
The present threat emerged in July 2002 when the Department of Transport published proposals for consultation which included building three new runways at Stansted - later modified to give policy support to the construction of one extra runway in the Air Transport White Paper in late 2003.
Stop Stansted Expansion was formed within a matter of days following the publication of the 2002 consultation and since that time has mounted a relentless campaign with support from thousands of individuals, hundreds of councils and a score of UK and European Parliamentarians all recognising the devastating impacts which expansion would have. Environmental groups including the National Trust, Woodland Trust, Essex Wildlife Trust, Wilderness Foundation UK, RSPB, Friends of the Earth, the Society for the Preservation of Ancient Buildings and Campaign to Protect Rural England and others are also vehemently opposed to the plans.
This is because the impacts of a two-runway airport handling up to 68 million passengers a year in its inital phase (more than Heathrow today) and with the capacity to eventually handle more than 90 million passengers a year would be enormous - across the region and beyond.
Even plans for expansion on the existing runway - the subject of a Public Inquiry in 2007 - could lead to a doubling of current passenger numbers (currently at 24 million passengers a year - compared with less than 4 million in 1996): SSE and the airlines who use Stansted agree that a forecast of c50 million passengers a year by 2030 is entirely feasible, going well beyond the ‘illustrative’ figure of ‘about 35 million by 2014′ which BAA claims.
Two Stansted Public Inquiries and a Royal Commission in the course of the last 30 years have ruled against Stansted expanding beyond a single runway, most recently in the 1980s when it was judged that a second runway at Stansted, in any position or location, would be an “environmental catastrophe”. The words of the Inspector, Graham Eyre QC (later Sir Graham Eyre) were as follows:
“I would not be debasing the currency if I express my judgement that the development of an airport at Stansted, with a capacity in excess of 25mppa and requiring the construction and operation of a second runway and all the structural and operational paraphernalia of a modern international airport as we know the animal in 1984, would constitute nothing less than a catastrophe in environmental terms.”
The Wilderness Foundation UK wholeheartedly pledges its support for the campaign against further expansion of Stansted Airport on the grounds that such a development would have a serious and lasting impact on the environment and wildlife of rural Essex and its communities. We will be closely following developments in the planning phase, highlighting our concerns when and where possible and establishing a policy of cross-communication and collaboration with SSE, including events during the year where will encourage our Friends to join us and visit what are, at the moment, beautiful, tranquil corners of Essex, where the peace will be shattered if this development is given the green light.
