England is a very crowded country. we need a certain amount of agricultural land in order to feed ourselves,ensure fresh milk etc.
There are large tracts of moorland....so who wants to live in the Scottish highlands, Dartmoor or the Yorkshire moors, outside established communities, roads, services and infrastructure....they're undeveloped for good reason!
Airfields are usually close to communities and many do not use their space ,it benig just "wasted" grass areas...then there's the "blighted" areas on the Runway flight-paths.
All in all, the developers see an under-utilised site in a prime inhabited area.
France has roughly the same population as UK but is
twice the size -hence, half the population density.
Sorry, just run the economics....it's a lot of land tied up for a relatively tiny amount of usage......
In the case of Bourn....multiply the proposed development's rate-revenue, then compare with what it's currently returning to the council as an airfield.
It's spelt G R A V Y T R A I N no council is going to turn it away,if they can get the cash-cow development through.
Stand by for Gertrude's robust rebuttal and assertion that councils bend over backward to promote GA.
