Friends of the Earth
Action Briefing Dec 99/Jan 00
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Birmingham Friends of the Earth Action Briefing Dec 99/Jan 00 |
It was a normal Saturday morning in the sleepy Warwickshire village of Sambourne. A few ramblers made their way across the village green and past the Green Dragon pub. There was a bit of activity in the car park, a truck, a few cars and some people, workmen of some sort. It was a bit unusual as the pub had yet to open its doors for the morning, but really nothing out of the ordinary.
A closer look and passers-by might have noticed the loudspeakers on the back of the truck and that the people, dressed in white overalls and Day-Glo yellow jackets were carrying what appeared to be giant yellow lollipops; but they didn't.
Just ten minutes later the car park scene burst into life. The lollipop people began to rehearse their routine, simple steps, waving their lollipop signs; choreographed by a man in a long black coat. A generator kicked in on the back of the lorry and a sound system began blasting out ear splitting aircraft noise. From the cars emerged reporters and cameramen to record the proceedings.
Then just as quickly as it started, it was over. Their rehearsal finished, the troupe, followed by the press, made their way out of the car park towards their destination just a few hundred yards up the road. A few minutes later the truck followed. Blasting out aircraft noise it rounded the corner into Sambourne Lane where the airport marshals were waiting in their overalls and Day-Glo jackets. The local residents came out of their homes to watch as the marshals flagged the truck-borne sound system in to its destination, Walnut Cottage, the home of Brian Summers, managing director of Birmingham International Airport.
It all began with the article in the last (Oct/Nov) issue of this newsletter about the environmental problems associated with expansion of Birmingham Airport (which had been given permission to double its 1996 capacity by 2005). The letter writing campaign that followed included correspondence with Brian Summers himself, the airport MD, who insisted that all environmental problems associated with the expansion of the airport had been addressed.
Not believing this to be the case we decided we needed to speak to the people who had to live near to the airport. Using a couple of articles in the local papers and shop window adverts, we appealed to local residents to contact us with their experiences of airport noise and pollution. The response was overwhelming, we were inundated with letters and phone calls from all areas around the airport. Here are just a few quotes to give you a flavour of the responses:
Mr. Bill Crump of Marston Green complained that the planes are flying over at under 1000 ft. making a terrific noise. This summer was beautiful, but I had to keep my doors and windows constantly shut.
Mary Palmer, a pensioner also from Marston Green said, I have to resort to sleeping tablets to avoid being woken up and have to wear ear plugs when I'm out in the garden. They are supposed to have introduced quieter aircraft, but the noise is getting worse, and the bunds make no difference.
Jean Browne from Sheldon told us: My husband is 60% deaf, when he is in the garden he has to switch off his hearing aid, how would the directors and such like, like to live with this noise?
It was clear to us that the environmental problems caused by the present volume of air traffic had yet to be addressed, let alone those from any expansion. We echoed Jean Browne's thought about how the airport directors would like living with this noise. The answer of course was that they wouldn't, which is why they live in peaceful, picture postcard villages like Sambourne.
We decided that we had to give Mr. Summers a taste of his own medicine and turn Sambourne into Marston Green for a couple of hours one Saturday morning. We hadn't got an aircraft but we had got the next best thing, a truck and some loudspeakers that we could take right to the doorstep of the man responsible for running the airport. We pitched the idea to the press and some of the residents that we had been talking to, they all liked it and so that was it.
So, a few weeks later, there we all were outside Mr. Summers house, being deafened by aircraft noise, waiting for the man to appear on his doorstep, but he didn't show. Perhaps he was just a bit publicity shy. The BBC reporter was having none of it and marched up to his front door, but there was no answer, it appeared that nobody was in! This was the one thing we couldn't legislate for. Desperate for a quote from an annoyed Sambourne resident the reporter knocked on all the neighbour's doors instead, but to no avail, everybody was very supportive of the action which pleased us if not the man from the BBC.
With Mr. Summers not being in residence that was about it for the action. We returned to the Green Dragon, its doors now open, to have a drink and reflect on the day. So far, despite the absence of Mr. Summers, it had been successful, our aim had been get the message into the media, and that we had already achieved that with local radio broadcasts throughout the day. It remained to be seen to what extent the press and TV would pick up on the story, but we were confident.
Back home, at 5.40 PM, we switched on BBC Midlands today, and waited. As the presenter began his opening sentence we realised that we had achieved what we wanted, we were the main story of the day. The report was fair and even the tag line about Brian Summers not being home to see the demonstration did not seem to affect the message we had got across.
But that's not the end of the story, the airport campaign has only just begun, so keep watching this space.