RESPONSE TO THE DEPARTMENT FOR TRANSPORT THE FUTURE DEVELOPMENT OF AIR TRANSPORT IN THE UK NOVEMBER 2002 CONTENTS Page No. Executive Summary 2 Introduction 5 Format of Response 6 Overall Policy 6 The Regions outside the South East 11 The South East and Eastern Region 17 Appendix A 26 Appendix B 28 Appendix C 29 Appendix D 62 SASIG County Hall Penrhyn Road Kingston upon Thames Surrey KT1 2DT Tel: 020 8541 9459 Fax: 020 8541 8051 E-mail:
[email protected] Web address: www.sasig.org Air Transport in the UK 1 SASIG: November 2002 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Strategic Aviation Special Interest Group (SASIG) of the Local Government Association comprises some 75 local authorities that have an interest and responsibility for major aviation issues within their administrative areas. The population represented by SASIG is some 23 million. SASIG has campaigned for many years for a long-term aviation strategy for the UK. Whilst looking 30 years ahead is difficult, it is the minimum time frame over which to ensure that any strategy can show the vision necessary to avoid incremental growth at existing airports. SASIG accepts the Government’s mid point forecasts of 500 million passengers per annum at 2030 as the basis for formulating airports policy, but expects the Government to develop a strategy that has viability for at least another 10 years so as to accommodate higher or slower growth. SASIG believes that policies based on predict and provide do not allow sufficient account to be taken of the need for aviation to meet its external costs.