Council rejects runway inquiry start date
01.08.08
The public inquiry into Stansted's second runway plans is to be postponed, the Herts & Essex Observer has reported. On Tuesday, planning authority Uttlesford District Council (UDC) confirmed it had invoked its right to reject the January 13 start date set last week when the plan was ‘called in’ by Communities & Local Government Secretary Hazel Blears.
The council can refuse to accept the Government's timetable once, and must now ‘seek to agree a new date with BAA’. If they fail to reach agreement within a month, a new date can be imposed by the Planning Inspectorate.
Council chief executive John Mitchell described the January 13 deadline as ‘wholly unrealistic’. He has written to the Planning Inspectorate, demanding a delay and pointing out that when Stansted asked for permission to simply remove the 25m-a-year passenger limit and handle up to 35m on its existing single runway, the public inquiry started 13 months after the application was lodged - yet the current second runway timetable allows just 9 months' gap for a much larger scheme.
The timetable reservations are shared by campaign group Stop Stansted Expansion (SSE). Director Carol Barbone said: ‘From our point of view, the start date itself is not the issue, but the time between the inquiry opening date and sight of the inspector's report on last year's inquiry [into plans to increase passengers at the airport] and decision notice because of the bearing their content will have on the way forward.’
A BAA spokesman told the newspaper that it was prepared to present its evidence in January but was willing to negotiate with UDC about a short delay. He said: ‘It is in everyone's interest to work out a date that's mutually acceptable.’
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