Plane Stupid indeed
I’d just like to add my voice to those supporting the actions and aims of Greenpeace and Plane Stupid with regard to the expansion plans at Heathrow. It is environmental (with both a small and a large “e”) insanity and completely unneccessary. This is all about the determination of BAA and the government to ensure that the south of England hosts the aviation transport hubs of choice for Europe.
The nonsense about the UK economy needing this airport. Let’s be clear about that, our economy wants the airport, it doesn’t need it. Denmark does not have an airport that rivals Gatwick or Heathrow in terms of either size or aircraft movements and yet famously the Danes are reputed to be among the happiest people in the world. Of course, they are not happy because they don’t have one of the world’s busiest airports, they are happy despite not having such an airport. The Danes aren’t exactly paupers either, so it seems reasonable to conclude that mass transit hubs are not necessary in order to experience the Good Life.
Naturally, if Heathrow becomes less competitive than other air transport hubs, jobs will be lost, but frankly, so what? If an effluent spewing pulp plant provides jobs for a local community, would we justify its expansion on job creation grounds? Jobs can be created in many different ways; we as a nation will just have to work a bit harder at encouraging more sustainable areas of economic activity. We could start by teaching our schoolchildren real and deep computing skills rather than merely how to word process documents and click buttons on proprietary GUIs. Non-trivial computing skills might even come in useful in an information-based economy!
Think what we have to gain, in addition to the reduction in ecological damage (at least locally), fewer, if any four-engined behemoths flying over your home late in the evening or at four or five in the morning. The ability to sit outside a pub or in your garden or yard, without hearing that incessant “Airbus whine” (despite living miles from the airport), it’ll be lovely, a major win for the aural environment of millions of people who live under or near the Heathrow flight paths.
Tags: quality of life