This should cause howls of protest from the anti-aviation brigade in the UK over the coming weeks.
In a document leaked to The Sunday Times Nats outlines plans to restructure Britain’s existing air corridors and add new ones in preparation for a doubling of the number of flights over the UK from 2.4m a year today to almost 5m by 2030. A confidential aeronautical map drawn up by Nats points to sharp increases in the number of aircraft using the 15 or so air corridors that criss-cross Britain, and the creation of several new flight paths and six new stacking areas where aircraft fly in circles while waiting for landing slots.
Steve Charlish, a commercial pilot who has led a campaign against increasing air traffic over the East Midlands, said: “If Nats were proposing a new motorway or bypass you could object but one thing you cannot do is touch the airspace above because that is owned by the crown - you’ve got no right of objection.”
Nats is, however, merely implementing an expansion policy drawn up by the government and set out in its 2003 aviation white paper. In it, Labour announced that it wanted to see new runways built at Stansted, Heathrow, Birmingham and Edinburgh. It also proposed increasing capacity at numerous other airports including Coventry, Doncaster, Lydd, near Dover, Kent International at Manston, Bristol and Wolverhampton. Overall, about 40 airports were given the go-ahead to expand.
full story here:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/new...cle1364880.ece