The intentions of London City airport to boost its yearly passenger ceiling from 6.5 million to nine million visitors have been authorized by the government of the United Kingdom.
This includes three more flights during the first half hour of operations throughout the week, but there is no increase in the number of yearly flights or infrastructure that is authorized.
A pledge was also included in the planning proposal, which stated that “only cleaner, quieter, next generation aircraft” would be permitted to fly during any lengthy periods of operation.
In the same request, London City Airport suggested expanding its Saturday afternoon operation hours; however, this proposal was not accepted.
The Chief Executive Officer of London City Airport, Alison FitzGerald, expressed her disappointment with the decision made by the government to reject our plan to fly from 12.30pm to 6.30pm on Saturday afternoons. “While we welcome the approval to increase our passenger numbers, we are disappointed with the decision,” she added.
Rejecting our request to extend our Saturday afternoon operating hours would hold down airlines’ ability to bring cleaner, quieter next-generation aircraft to the airport, as the government has acknowledged in its decision. She said, “This is something that the government has acknowledged.”
The fact that these aircraft would have been able to operate at the airport throughout the week, rather than simply during the expanded operating hours, would have been an additional advantage for the local population.
It was stated in the appeal decision that was published by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Department of Transport that “any aircraft movements in excess of six and up to nine movements between 0630 hours and 0659 hours on Mondays to Saturdays shall be restricted to the new generation aircraft, specifically the Airbus A220-100; Airbus A220-300; Embraer E190-E2; Embraer E195-E2, and any other aircraft that meets each of the new generation aircraft noise standards of the new generation.”
The reason for this is “to guarantee that the scheduled aircraft movements during the extended operating periods are only carried out by aircraft of the most recent generation “
According to Rokhsana Fiaz, the mayor of Newham, she expressed her worries to the BBC over the effect that increased aircraft noise will have on residents, but she expressed her satisfaction with the government’s agreement that the Saturday cut-off would continue to be in place.
She expressed her worry by saying, “I continue to be deeply concerned that our residents will be seriously harmed by the impact of further air-flight noise with today’s decision to allow an increase in flights in the early mornings throughout the rest of the week.”
In light of the fact that we continue to be worried about the potentially negative effects on the residents’ health and quality of life, we will be carefully examining the decision notice and taking into consideration all of the available choices.
