Agenda item

Councillor Victoria Wheeler had been appointed as the Council’s representative on the Heathrow Community Noise Forum in May 2019. 

Councillor Wheeler made a presentation on the work of the Forum which had been set up in 2015 in response to local concerns regarding future changes to airspace as a result of the Government’s airspace modernisation strategy.  The Forum was made up of representatives from local authorities around Heathrow, NATS, British Airways, Department for Transport, Civil Aviation Authority and Heathrow.

The aims of the Forum were to

·         keep community representatives and local authority stakeholders informed and seek their input in preparing for and consulting on future airspace modernisation as part of the Government’s airspace modernisation strategy and airspace changes associated with Heathrow expansion;

·         improve understanding of members on Heathrow’s operations and airspace issues;

·         seek input from members to inform the communications approach to trials and public consultations regarding potential airspace changes;

·         build trust in the data through members involvement in the independent verification of the data and analysis of data.

Arising from questions and comments from Members the following points were noted:

·         Changes and increases in aircraft did not need to be the subject of consultation.

·         The difference between noise and annoyance were hard to define, had different effects on health and wellbeing and could differ according to background of the location e.g the impact of noise was greater in rural areas.

·         There had been no studies on the impact of noise on the SPA.

·         It was suggested that a third runway would have no greater impact on noise in the Borough than the technological developments likely to be introduced.

·         Residents should complain if affected by noise and could use a flight radar App to give details of planes and altitude.

The Committee thanked Councillor Wheeler for her interesting and informative presentation.