Heathrow flight paths over Wycombe isn't the problem

His Cabinet has, of course, been rather mobile of late. Instead of locking itself up in the safety of No10 for its weekly meetings, it has been going on a road show – sort of like Radio One used to do.

Presumably it is to try to calm down the restless natives in the wake of the ‘Economic Crisis and Other Problems Facing New Labour’. Last week it was in Liverpool.

However I have no reports of the Cabinet coming to High Wycombe in the wake of the news that we are likely to be on the wrong end of the deal to switch around the Heathrow flight paths.

Obviously our natives are not yet restless enough. But that may change.

Of course if the Cabinet did come it could use the Red Lion portico over the now former Woolies store and so follow in the footsteps of other famous – I use that word advisedly in Brown’s case – politicians such as Disraeli and Churchill.

Anyway in the protracted and fierce battle over Heathrow, campaigners last week dug up another fact in the wealth of information that has been spewed out. Certainly someone somewhere is doing a sterling job ploughing through the zillions of words in the Government’s consultation document.

This fact was buried in the darkest recesses revealing that a change to flight paths would see a significant increase in the number of aircraft over High Wycombe and Amersham.

Apparently this information can be found by comparing two small maps on pages 53 and 78 of the consultation document. A footnote simple adds that the extra flights for Heathrow would require ‘major airspace changes’.

How the good people of Wycombe and Amersham feel about this is as yet unclear, though I suspect it won’t bother those living adjacent to the M40.

The roar of the motorway will still drown out the planes.

Living in close proximity to aircraft is nothing new for me. My dad was in the RAF. When we lived in Yorkshire we had Beverleys – those were planes the size of a council house estate – rumbling in at all hours as well as the stunning Lightning jets which had a top speed of Mach 2.1 (1,390mph) screaming in and out of the base.

Also before coming to Hazlemere, we lived in Colnbrook for a year.

This village is famous for two things. The Ostrich Inn, one of the many ‘third oldest pubs in England’, where landlord Jarman disposed of overnight customers by dumping them through a trapdoor into an acid bath, and being at the end of a Heathrow runway.

Jets streamed in over the village every 90 seconds – or out over it every 90 seconds depending on Heathrow’s alternation programme. You got use to them – except Concorde.

That stopped all conversation not only because you never tired of watching such a magnificent aircraft, but because you couldn’t hear yourself speak anyway.

So how bad will it be for Wycombe? Well apart from the odd chunk of ice from a plane’s loo dropping through someone’s roof, certainly not as bad as for those living closest to Heathrow where you wonder how they’ve escaped having tyre skid marks across the roofs.

But it is relative. Going from very few planes at several thousand feet to a continuous stream will become noticeable. It will be a new noise added to our urban cacophony – but that will eventually blend in with the rest.

Frankly the issue about Heathrow is significantly more important than just altered flight paths.

Expanding it shouldn’t even be the right option.

After all if Las Vegas can relocate its airport twice – and is about to do so for a third time – to move it away from its expanding urban sprawl and Hong Kong can build the new Chek Lap Kok airport on an artificial island for the same reason, surely it’s not beyond the whim of our country to do likewise?

FOOTNOTE: Apologies to poster George, On The Edge is a weekly column written by Paul Mortimer that is published every Tuesday in the Midweek, but the by line was inadvertently left off this week's web edition