LDC’s

No, this is not a new type of TV or computer screen. Many of you may have happened upon this abbreviation whilst reading the planning section of the consultants report commissioned by Thanet District Council about night flying proposals at Manston airport. The abbreviation stands for Lawful Development Certificate and is issued by a local authority when an applicant requests such a certificate based on a use which has been  established for at least 10 years and is subsisting on a site. The local authority is obliged to issue such a certificate if the necessary conditions are met.

This goes a long way to explaining the current unsatisfactory planning situation at Kent International Airport. Faced with a declining military use for Manston airport the Ministry of Defence applied for LDCs to support the changeover to civilian use, which had been happening in some parts of the airport in parallel with the military use. Faced with such an influential applicant, I think TDC conceded their position and relied on a loosely drafted 106 agreement in an attempt to control the situation.

Under normal circumstances an established use LDC and a 106 agreement would be sufficient to control any future development proposals. However in the case of night flights this is only an increase in traffic movements, not really a planning matter, as “intensification” can only be controlled if a material change of use can be proved. The 106 agreement does not even require approval of a night flying policy only that one is submitted prior to commencement. It therefore follows that Manston can commence night flying tomorrow, having submitted a policy, hence night flying for the Olympics and maybe after.

Infratil is not advertising this loophole however, because airport expansion inevitably requires new buildings.(see picture above). Any new building on the airfield will require full planning permission, which is best wrapped up in glossy expansion plans with a promise of many jobs to mask the transition from their established use on LDC, to expansion requiring planning permission.


For those of you interested in this subject you may like to read a previous post of mine on the same subject here, it would appear now that I was not in possession of the full facts at the time and the title should have read "Night Flying Consultation UNNECESSARY!"

I saw it in the tea cups

NO - I am not claiming to be psychic and I don't read tea leaves but I do like a nice"cuppa"tea. One thing which struck me when I first moved to Thanet was the poor water quality. I moved here from South Suffolk which boasts one of the most modern reservoirs in the country, Alton Water, which was built in the 1970's.
Alton Water was constructed by damming and flooding a river valley. A listed watermill and cottages were removed, brick by brick, from the valley floor and re-constructed in the Museum of East Anglian Life where they are still today. Construction of the reservoir was an upheaval at the time but now it is a country park with wading birds, sailing, fishing, country walks and cycling. This is what I call an integrated plan for the future, which I think is lacking  in Thanet.

Coming back to the tea cups, they are both empty cups from my two cups of tea this morning. The one on the left was brewed using bottled water from Waitrose and the one on the right, brewed from tap water which had passed through two filters, installed in my home to improve water quality. As I said in the title, everyday I am reminded that water quality is not the best advert for Thanet.

This topic is particularly relevent at the moment, when the Environment Agency is consulting on run-off water from Manston airport being discharged into Pegwell Bay, it seems the choice we have is either preserving an outstanding SSSI, which is Pegwell Bay, or continuing to contaminate our drinking water. Well at least Waitrose will benefit from increased sales of bottled water.