News

Consultation on MVDC Housing and Traveller Sites Plan – Additional Sites ends on July 21st 2014

The Parish Council has drawn up a draft response which is able to read under ‘Council Documents’ on its web site at www.capel-pc.gov.uk . This document will be discussed at the meeting of the Parish Council Planning Committee on Monday July 7th in the  Committee Room at Capel Village Hall starting at 7:30pm. The meeting is open to the public.

MVDC is also holding a ‘drop in’ event at the Beare Green Village Hall, Merebank on Wednesday 2nd July from 3.0pm till 8.00pm when members of the MVDC Planning Policy Team will be available to answer your questions on the additional sites for Capel, Beare Green, Hookwood and Charlwood.

Gatwick

New Flight Paths: Gatwick Airport Ltd have launched phase 2 of the Gatwick Airport Airspace Consultation, their plans to redraw many of the flight paths around Gatwick. The document is at: www.gatwickairport.com/gatwickairspaceconsultation . These proposals could have serious impact on many towns and villages around the airport and will potentially affect an area from Guilford to Tunbridge Wells and from Petworth to Sevenoaks.

The 60-page consultation document is written in technical language and is difficult for the layperson to understand. The Parish Council will be drawing up bullet points to include in its response to the consultation at the meeting of the Parish Council’s Planning Committee on July 7th 2014 at 7.30pm in the Committee Room at Capel Village Hall. The meeting is open to the public so is you require further information on how to respond you are welcome to attend. The consultation finishes on Friday 15th August. Please note that the proposed new flight paths all relate to the existing runway. If ever a new Gatwick runway were to be built, all the flight paths will need to be revised, with new flight paths over areas at present peaceful.

Gatwick Coordination Group

MPs Crispin Blunt, Sir Paul Beresford, Rt Hon Sir Nicholas Soames, Rt Hon Sir John Stanley, and Charles Hendry have formed the Gatwick Coordination Group following a meeting at the House of commons on Wednesday 11th June 2014.

The Gatwick Coordination Group is established to represent the serious local concern at the plan for a second runway at Gatwick Airport which has been shortlisted by the Davies Commission. Gatwick Airport Limited (GAL) has made its submission to Sir Howard Davies, which is yet to be published. Sir Howard’s Commission will make its recommendation on airport capacity to the government in 2015.

The group released the following statement:

“We believe that the building of a second runway at Gatwick Airport would be a disaster for the surrounding communities and environment. The level of development, associated with an airport serving nearly three times as many passengers as it does now, would devastate the local environment and leave the UK with its major airport in the wrong place.

There is also no adequate plan yet presented to provide the necessary infrastructure, of all types, to support this development.

The size of Gatwick site only lends itself to a single runway airport, serving as a sensible, competitive alternate to London’s main hub airport. While they pursue that objective, Gatwick Airport Limited will have our support, but this proposal is not in the local interest, nor is it in the national interest, and this group will work to prove that case.”

Jackie Coke, Clerk to the Council, 01306 712447, email capelpc@btconnect.com