The Parish Council have been consulted on a proposal by London Oxford Airport, locally known as Kidlington, to change the class of airspace in the vicinity of the airport from Uncontrolled to Controlled. Representatives of the council will be attending a drop in session on February 27th to find out about these proposed changes and any implications to our community.  

Please feedback any comments to the clerk@steeplebartonpc.co.uk. 

 

Please see below for information received from London Oxford Airport and County Councillor Ian Hudspeth -

Oxford Airport

London Oxford Airport intends to invest in new GPS-based arrival procedures and proposes a re-designating of local uncontrolled airspace to controlled airspace, in order to contain and protect these new procedures. 

The re-design will enhance levels of safety on the LOA approach and improve efficiency by reducing the number of broken off approaches.  The new designs will also enable more effective coordination between LOA and RAF Brize Norton traffic.

We have now drafted our proposal for the new procedures and airspace and wish to consult with the local community, local councils and aviation stakeholders to gather the views of those individuals and organisations who may be affected by these proposed changes.

The consultation period will commence on Friday 15 December 2017 and will finish on 22 March 2018.  To see the plans, and find out how you can comment, please visit our webpage at: 

http://www.oxfordairport.co.uk/business-aviation-3-4-5/public-consultation/

Any questions or comments about the proposed changes can be recorded via our website or directed to Osprey Consulting Services Ltd who are managing this process for us.  Please email Osprey using the following address:  

londonoxfordairportconsultation@ospreycsl.co.uk

 

Information from Councillor Ian Hudspeth -

There are two elements to the ACP these are:

1. The introduction of controlled airspace which will be classified as Class D.

This change if approved by the CAA only allows aircraft to the enter Class D airspace with ATC permission, subject to being suitably equipped with radios and transponders allowing communication and more importantly radar identification. The current airspace classification is Class G which is open airspace, any flying machine can use it without permission. This clearly gives us a safety concerns when aircraft not talking to Oxford ATC and not using their transponders cross our Air Traffic Zone (ATZ) boundary (2 NM Radius) conflicting with aircraft approaching on the instrument landing system (ILS) which results in a break off from the approach.  

1. Introduction of Global Positioning Satellite procedures (GPS).

With the advances in technology and the full deployment of the EGNOS European satellite system which releases the reliance on the US GPS systems, new procedures are available for aircraft to use. The deployment has opened the door for performance based navigation (PBN) systems based on the satellite accuracy. Not only are the procedures accurate to within centimetres allowing precise approaches via several waypoints the aircraft will fly to and ultimately position to land, they improve the minima aircraft can operate to in poor weather.  They are at a standard equivalent of an ILS system.  The system provides performance based navigation meaning aircraft are flown to and from airports in the most direct and efficient way reducing emissions and fuel burn, which links overall with national airspace change initiatives where environmental improvements as a direct result of the new technology and systems can be made.

 

Tackley

 

The ACP and GPS navigation does not fundamentally change the way the aircraft approach to land.  Tackley village sits directly under the CAA certified, approved and established approach path for runway 19 and the climb out for runway 01 as indicated below.  Tackley is currently overflown this will not change with the introduction of PBN GPS procedures introduction, aircraft are required to be established on a stable approach at approx. 6-10 miles from touchdown.  The airports safeguarded surfaces as indicated are provided to protect aircraft from high developments and provide an area required to be free from hazards to allow a safe approach to land and climb out.

 

I aim to explain the detail in the Airport Consultative Committee meeting which is due to sit this month.  In addition we will be holding a public meeting as well as a drop in day for local parishes, the community in general as well as local councils that have been identified as stakeholders, this event will be held at the airport with our consultants Osprey in attendance as well as airport staff, the public meeting date will be notified in due course

 

 

http://www.oxfordairport.co.uk/business-aviation-3-4-5/public-