Coventry Airport

Part of the debate – in Westminster Hall at 3:30 pm on 27 January 2004.

Alert me about debates like this

Photo of James Plaskitt James Plaskitt Labour, Warwick and Leamington 3:30, 27 January 2004

I will come to that.

Coventry can offer night flights because it has a 24-hour operating licence, which some other regional airports do not have. Introducing the service will fundamentally change the nature of the airport, which is why I raise the matter, and it is creating understandable alarm and concern among many of my constituents who live extremely close to the airport. The service is due to start in about eight weeks' time and will be at full throttle by May this year.

The airport began its life as a second world war aerodrome. Today, it is a single-runway airport, which is home to several small flight training and freight operations. I should not forget to mention the airport's quaint collection of disused railway carriages and rusting locomotives, which are partly surrounded by a dilapidated chain-link fence that, even today, would hardly deter a handful of passing curious sheep. Yet we are being asked to believe that in a very short space of time, this airport will begin handling 2 million passengers a year and will deal with all that that involves. It is therefore unsurprising that the airport has lodged a planning application for a brand new terminal and associated car parking, but it is very surprising that the service is about to start without them. Indeed, Warwick district council's planning department will not even consider the application until about four weeks before the first jet is due to scream over my constituents in Bubbenhall, a village just the other side of the aforementioned fence. All that activity is due to start out of temporary buildings.

I understand the allure of cheap flights to the Mediterranean, and I am sure that many of my constituents make good use of them. I have nothing against Thomsonfly trying to get into the business; I totally understand why it would want to do so. However, it should not do that out of Coventry airport. What was the point of the Government's consultation exercise? What is the point of the White Paper, "The Future of Air Transport", which was supposed to set out a strategy? It clearly says that expansion to meet anticipated increases in demand for that sort of travel in the west midlands should be met at Birmingham and East Midlands airports. The budget airlines already operate from those places, so I am far from persuaded that Thomsonfly needs to start the service out of Coventry airport. I understand that it is also talking to about 20 other regional airports in the UK, none of which is a former second world war aerodrome and all of which are established and have the necessary infrastructure to start a budget airline operation. The only possible reason for starting at Coventry is because it is cheap: it has nothing to do with the Government's air transport strategy and everything to do with quick profit for one company.

I want the Minister to address some specific issues, the first of which is the capacity of Coventry airport. Planning documents show that it currently has a runway of 1,610 m, which is close to the operational minimum required for Boeing 737-500 aeroplanes. Birmingham's proposed short runway is to be 2,000 m. Work is already under way to extend the runway, but there is a serious issue as to whether that is within the airport's permitted development rights. It is trying to add runway-end safety areas. I am told that the airport will submit a report to the aerodrome standards department, which will indicate runway extensions of 90 m, but the recommended length for runway-end safety areas is 240 m. For it to reach that length, major alterations to the runway would be required, for which the airport would need planning permission. That planning permission is not being sought.

The next main issue that I wish to raise with the Minister is that of airspace conflict, which my hon. Friend Mr. Cunningham mentioned. Birmingham's runway is aligned at magnetic bearing 150° 33, whereas Coventry's runway is aligned at 51° 231, which means that they are at right angles to each other. There is crossing air traffic from the two airports and the runways are just 13 miles apart.

In the run-up to publishing the White Paper, the Government consulted on the Rugby option. If that option had been allowed, Birmingham airport would have had to close because of the conflict of air space, yet the Rugby site is 17 miles away, while Coventry airport is just 13 miles away. I accept that the Coventry development is not of the scale that we would have seen had the Rugby option gone ahead, but the fact that airport closures were envisaged in that area during the consultation serves to underline how tight the airspace is and, therefore, how serious the potential for airspace conflict.

Coventry airport is beneath the lateral limits of Birmingham's control area, and Birmingham National Air Traffic Services controls the traffic movements in and out of Coventry. There are certain operational freedoms for flights in and out of Coventry up to about 2,000 ft and for a radius of 2 nautical miles. That area goes over about 1,000 homes in my constituency. The fact that the two airports are so close together already leads to delays arising from the airspace conflict. We should remember, in the context of what might be about to happen in Coventry, that Birmingham airport has been cleared to get a second runway. Its passenger volumes are growing at a rate of 10 per cent. a year. If there is air conflict between the airports now, what will it be like if the projected rate of expansion takes place at Birmingham and this budget operation starts to operate out of Coventry?