Battersea Matters the newsletter of the Battersea Society SPRING 2017 Heathrow: more noise and pollution? John Stewart outlines what Heathrow’s expansion would mean for Battersea third runway would have a a third runway is built, there will be significant impact on no scheduled flights between 11pm A Battersea. Although the and 5.30am. That is seen, however, flight path to the new runway as simply a minor concession. Most would be north of the river – over people in Battersea don’t plan on Hammersmith and Chiswick – the starting their day at 5.30! number of flights over Battersea The Government argues that a would increase as planes flew new runway at Heathrow offers most across the area to join the new for the economy. It also looked at flight path. Heathrow expects a the option of an Estuary Airport but quarter of a million aircraft to use rejected it on a number of grounds, the third runway each year. Not including cost. It has said it regards all of these will fly over Battersea a second runway at Gatwick as a but it will not escape an increase credible option. Wandsworth Council in aircraft numbers. backs Gatwick. It argues that with At present the Department Gatwick being little more than half for Transport is consulting on its an hour from Clapham Junction by proposals for the new runway. fast train, a second runway could increase both employment and Vote travel opportunities for Wandsworth The consultation ends on 25 residents. May. If, after considering the Gatwick would certainly have fewer consultation responses, the local impacts than a third runway at Government decides it wants to Heathrow. At present over 725,000 proceed with the third runway, people are impacted by noise from it will have a vote in Parliament, Some of the planes that fly over Vauxhall in a single Heathrow. At Gatwick it is less probably towards the end of this hour. © Phil Weedon than 12,000, rising to 37,000 with a year. the new runway. second runway. Gatwick has neither If Parliament gives the new runway Most local authorities in west the air pollution nor traffic problems its backing, Heathrow Airport would London are opposed to it and five of associated with Heathrow. draw up detailed plans for it. These them, including Wandsworth Council, would be put out to consultation next are expected to mount a legal Connectivity year and go to a Planning Inquiry challenge if Parliament gives it the At present, though, the Government in 2019. The earliest a new runway go-ahead. seems set on expanding Heathrow. could open would be 2024. Of course, we have been here It believes it has a majority in The proposal has divided west before. Ten years ago the last Labour Parliament to get it through. It says London. The polls show there is Government agreed to a third runway that a third runway is needed to some support for it but it is also at Heathrow only for the Coalition increase our connectivity to the meeting considerable opposition. Government to cancel it in 2010. rest of the world and particularly to Noise is the main worry of local This time round the Government emerging nations such as China and people. There are also concerns is talking up what would be on India. It argues that, unless we build about air pollution – already areas offer to residents if a third runway a new runway, we are in danger of around Heathrow exceed the legal was built. Night flights have long being overtaken by rival European limit – as well as the extra traffic it been an issue in Battersea. The first airports such as Frankfurt or Charles might generate on London’s roads. plane, arriving at 4.30am, acts as de Gaulle as, on current projections, And, of course, thousands of people the unwanted alarm clock for many all the runways in London and the will lose their homes to make way for people. Heathrow is saying that, if continued on page 3 Don’t forget to visit our website: batterseasociety.org.uk for regular updates on Battersea Society news, events and planning matters From the editor to have fun with others or how to help Individual high street shops are often other people. Our talks and outings considered to be a guarantor of What is are a way of engaging residents. We neighbourliness. But chain stores can neighbour- encourage them to get involved. provide that too. I had a mildly risqué liness? Do My own experience of Battersea is conversation with a member of staff you feel your of an area full of neighbourliness and a at B&Q recently that set me up with a neighbour- strong sense of community. However smile all day. hood is the rapid turnover of the population Another reason to smile is the neighbourly? makes this more and more difficult weather, and the wonderful spring Can you give to maintain. The exorbitant price of we are having. Temperatures your house houses and flats means that many like July and a mass of glorious keys to someone, or ask them to feed people rent, often for short periods, blossom – better this year than your cat, or pop round for a cuppa if so they are unlikely to develop much ever, I think. The cemetery on you’re feeling a bit fed up? Or at least emotional commitment to the area and Bolingbroke Grove/Battersea say hello when you see them in the have little incentive to make friends Rise was awash with primroses street? As more of life is conducted locally. and bluebells and whitebells and online, especially but not exclusively Mostly these are things that we alive with birdsong. And the winter for the young, there is more need can’t do much about individually. But garden in Battersea Park was a joy. for personal contact – we are highly we can pass a few words on the street [email protected] social animals after all. I think this is or the communal staircase and, if the 020 7350 2749 a role that the Battersea Society can neighbour is a longer term resident, help to fill. We tell people about what perhaps we can encourage them to is going on locally, where you can go join the Battersea Society. Man on the Battersea Bus Mike Roden looks at family history, and takes a trip on a slow boat to Greenwich. ‘Reveal where your ancestors came that they’d been in that area on was a from’ is the call to action from the English/Welsh border for a very controversial ancestry.co.uk, promising you that long time and the test declared political the results of their DNA testing me to be 84% British and 5% issue. Since will give you ‘a breakdown of your Irish. Unfortunately the test doesn’t factories, ethnicity, revealing your ethnic mix distinguish between England, Wales sweatshops and building sites from the past 500 – 1000 years.’ As a or Scotland so I can’t claim to be a depended on low paid labour from Christmas present to ourselves (more quintessential Englishman, though of out of town the government could exciting than socks or chocolates!) course I am. not ban immigrants. Instead ministers we both gave it a go in the spirit of attempted to assuage the fears of the discovery. Muttered public by claiming to get tough on the It’s a pity that the actor John Hurt I did try to maintain my English stiff criminals and work-dodgers – which didn’t try this before agreeing to upper lip a few weeks ago as we meant locking up large numbers of appear on the TV programme Who stood in a long queue to buy tickets innocents. Officers scanned the new Do You Think You Are? The show for a boat to Greenwich. Of course arrivals … and arrested those they forensically demolished his fervent there was nothing stoical about the thought looked drunk, work-shy or belief in his Irish ancestry, and his way I muttered intolerantly about even slightly untidy.’ relationship to the Marquis of Sligo the customers in front of me who The year in question was 1777 and – a history which had been entirely clearly did not have English as their the people were arriving not from invented by his great grandfather. first language and would cause us to overseas but from all over England. When the results of our tests miss the boat. In fact, the ticket office The paragraph is taken from Kate arrived by email there were few coped perfectly well and we made Williams’s 2006 biography England’s surprises. Angela knows that her it in time and I felt duly chastened Mistress, the compelling story of the family travelled from Ireland to about my attitude to the foreign rise and fall of Emma Hamilton a Manchester in the early 20th century, visitors. woman who was so much more than and she’s 95% Irish. Her late mother I was reminded of this incident simply Nelson’s mistress. would have denied this, unlike John when I read these words the other Plus ça change. Makes you think, Hurt always insisting that she was day: doesn’t it? Mind how you go, and see English. ‘With hundreds of new people … you next time. My own forebears were clay arriving in London every day and pipe manufacturers in Shropshire the population complaining about in the mid 1750s with all the signs overcrowding and crime, immigration 2 continued from page 1 back getting these better links to the promising quieter planes and steeper South East will be full by 2040 at the rest of the world for years as a third approaches to cut the noise.