LETTER: Heathrow is the clear decision

We do not wish the misery on Heathrow residents but Gatwick was more than happy to dump the misery of an airport larger than Heathrow on us.

The difference being that we have no infrastructure to support it and as the Commission has clearly said, Gatwick specialises in low cost air travel and brings the least into the UK economy.

With the Government looking to cut back further, we could have been left with an airport that specialises in taking money out of the UK with no investment in the infrastructure to support it. Gatwick dictating a mass inward migration of workers with their families looking for jobs, affordable housing, schools, GPs, hospitals, etc to our areas.

The jobs markets would have changed in the counties surrounding Gatwick with Gatwick management boasting that expansion would help Croydon, no mention of coastal regions but then how would they get to Gatwick? By road or by the second worst railway line in the country?

Croydon itself has three to four per cent unemployment and a bottleneck where the M23 goes to a single lane which is currently constantly congested; so who was to pay for an underpass or flyover?

It should be noted that not all local businesses supported Gatwick expansion or are members of these organisation that suggest they represent them.

It was very clear that Gatwick only looked to pay for what assisted Gatwick and not the local communities that would be subjected to picking up the bills via council tax increases.

Gatwick has spent millions playing on the misery of Heathrow residents to turn them into nimbys whilst happy to dump an airport larger than Heathrow in West Sussex with only one access road, M23 which will be at full capacity in 2030 without Gatwick 2, and one railway line, the second worst in the country, that can’t be expanded.

Long haul has always failed out of Gatwick unless they are exporting bucket and spade travellers to Dubai to spend money there; Gatwick’s number one destination is Spain.

It is about time that the CEO of Gatwick, Mr Wingate, realised we do not live with the cows in the fields, we live in highly populated villages, towns, historic thriving communities with very little unemployment. So as he has targeted us as minority groups to be ignored should he not now give up and deal with his current problems of residents anger at the changes he has already made to flight paths?

The MP vote will be if to go forward with Sir Howard’s recommendation. So having had an independent body spend three years investigating UK aviation and spent £20m of taxpayers’ money, Sir Howard and his team were clear, they unanimously found that Heathrow was the answer not Gatwick.

Why recreate another Heathrow disaster and cost us taxpayers billions only to export UK money overseas via Gatwick?

SALLY PAVEY

Chair of CAGNE, Mayes Lane

Warnham

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