Newham Planning's Case Officer has suggested that giving LCA approval to expand is the only way to secure improvements in monitoring and mitigation of environmental and noise issues.
Strange how the airports own 'up to date, state of the art' noise monitoring and the requirements of the section 106 put in place by the LB Newham didn't manage to achieve this over the past 7 years.....what hypocrisy LB Newham is full of. They share with LCA one thing: a total disregard for the impact on residents of noise and pollution. We have never seen anywhere in which a judgement on the environment and noise effects on a community can be made in the absence of actual noise measurements or an independent environmental impact study - and why is that? LB Newham appear to be scared to carry out their own independent readings for fear of the reality and of having to refuse LCA the application perhaps? We can only speculate on that. The circus they promote is an utter disgrace to their respective sectors. This will do nothing but further galvanise objectors to see this farcical consultation and application be called in by the Secretary of State.
Following paragraph taken from page 8 of the LB Newham LCA Committee report:
Having assessed the information submitted with the application, and the additional information to complete the Environmental Statement requested by way of Regulation 19 notices, it is concluded that there are negative environmental and economic impacts as well as economic benefits to the proposal. While mitigation can be achieved certain impacts such as the noise levels in outside open spaces cannot be effectively overcome. It is considered that on balance the adverse impacts of the proposal are not such as would justify withholding consent in light of the benefits and the relevant policy considerations. This is considered to be a finely balanced recommendation which can only be made subject to securing more effective monitoring and mitigation of the airport’s impacts on the local environment than are currently achieved. It is recognised that consent allows the opportunity to secure improvements in this regard.
