What the Snowdonia Society say about Kemble's plans for Llanbedr Airfield

Posted by TonyN on 20/05/2008 at 2:08 pm Llanbedr Airfield 1 Response »
May 202008

I’ve been looking at the Snowdonia Society’s website where they have a page devoted to their campaign to prevent Kemble Air Services re-starting flying operations at Llanbedr Airfield.

On BBC Radio Cymru yesterday, the director of the Snowdonia Society, Alun Pugh, assured listeners that he has a mandate from his members for the campaign to derail Kemble’s plans. But for this to be true, it is of course necessary for the membership to have access to impartial and accurate information about the issues. Given the massive support for Kemble in this area, I thought it would be worth having a look at what the society is telling their members about this campaign.

Here is the headline on their page:

Llanbedr Airport – Latest

This seems very strange, as there is no such place as Llanbedr Airport, nor has there ever been. Throughout its long history this establishment has never been known as anything other than Llanbedr Airfield; an accurate description. But I suppose that if you are running a campaign you cannot afford to be too fussy about such niceties as getting a name wrong. If the term airport gives potential supporters the impression that this remote rural airfield is about to become a rival to Heathrow, then why worry about it being thoroughly misleading?

The term airport implies a major centre for air travel, and there is absolutely no question of any such development taking place at Llanbedr.

Next, we find this: Continue reading »

Kemble are unlikely to turn Llanbedr Airfield into an airport

Posted by TonyN on 16/05/2008 at 8:00 pm Llanbedr Airfield No Responses »
May 162008

At another blog, I have been asked the following questions by ‘MH’:

Tony, I have no wish to talk about global warming here, but I would appreciate two things:

1. Can you substantiate how busy the airfield was before? How many flights a day and roughly how big the planes were? Obviously no-one cares about what things were like in the war, but how things were over the 10 or 20 years before it closed.

2. Can you tell what restrictions have been imposed (either through Planning Regulations or as part of the lease) on either the number, size or type of planes that can use the airfield now … or if there are night restrictions?

In the six years between 1998 and 2004, when QinetiQ ceased to operate from Llanbedr Airfield, there were 53,000 aerodrome and 14,000 radar movements. Continue reading »

Kemble Air Services to take over Llanbedr Airfield

Posted by TonyN on 14/05/2008 at 11:55 am Llanbedr Airfield 55 Responses »
May 142008

It’s not often that rural communities get good news these days. Foot and Mouth disease, Blue Tongue, rural poverty and crime, pitifully small farm incomes and the rising costs of transport seem to crowd into the headlines on a regular basis. So it is a pleasure to be able to report some good news for a change.

Four years ago, the airfield at Llanbedr, on the shores of Cardigan Bay in North Wales’ beautiful Snowdonia National Park, ran into difficulties after QinetiQ gave up their lease. In spite of a long and determined campaign to find a new operator it is only in the last week that we have heard that Kemble Air Services is planning to start operations before the end of the summer.

The airfield has been a part of life in Llanbedr for nearly seventy years, so few people alive today can remember a time when it was not part of the community; several generations of some families having worked there. Servicemen who were stationed here when it was an RAF station during and after WWII have married local girls and come to live in the village. Others who came here in the course of their careers have been reluctant to leave an area that had become their home and have settled in and around Llanbedr when they retired.

There is undoubtedly something incongruous about celebrating the contribution an airfield has made to a national park, but Continue reading »

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