Part 2 Art of photography

Artist Bea Keyes

Artist Carole Adams

Artist Drew Maple

unknown

Artist Kathy Conroy

Artist Lee Pelling

Artist Lucy Greenwood

Artist Malcolm Kirkaldie

Artist Jay Dawson

Artist Phil Eason

Artist Phil Eason

Artist Ralph Lombart

Western Undercliff unknown

The art of photography

Over the years I have been collecting Ramsgate based photos. There have been some absolutely brilliant pictures. No wonder people move to Ramsgate.

Artist Malcolm Kirkaldie

Artist Brian Whitehead

Artist Phil Eason

Artist Martin Wallace

Artist John "Smiddy" Smith

Artist Peter Kesby

Artist Frank Leppard

Artist Nick Powell

Artist Skyfairy

Artist Rebecca Douglas

Artist unknown

Artist John "Smiddy" Smith

Artist "No_Expert"

Artist Kane Guy

DCO accepted for examination

There was jubilation in the Airport Supporters last week when National Planning accepted the DCO application for "Examination". Does this mean aviation is returning to Manston? In a word NO.

What is now going to happen is people can register from the 3rd September 2018 so that they can submit their views to the examining inspector(s).

Every aspect of the application will be examined and questioned including whether there is enough money and whether there is a viable market for an Airfreight Hub.

Money
Even as they accepted the application for examination PINS wrote to RSP and warned them that their financial statement was underwhelming with many gaps included.

This clearly shows that PINS is not accepting that RSP have sufficient money available as all they confirm is they have drawn down £1/2M and as their parent company is based in Belize there is no proof that they have the £15M they say they have said would be sufficient to buy the land and Blight claims.

Business plan
At no place in the 11500 pages of submission have RSP elected to provide a solid business plan which covers all the costs (including payment of interest and running costs) nor indeed do they actually state where the freight will be coming from. Nor indeed do they show how much each landing fee will be and how that interacts with the running costs of the Freight Hub. To give you an idea of the costs involved in 1995 the local MP stated the running costs where in the region of £7M a year.
So PINS has accepted that to be an Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIP) it is only necessary to have 5000 planes land and take off in a year. which is just under 14 a day. So how does that compare to its previous operational air transport movements

Best year (under Tony Freudman) 3333 of which airfreight 730, airfreight being 2 planes a day. For those that do not remember Planestation went into receivership in 2005 and Infertil bought the remnants from the official receiver umped £40-50M and still failed to make a profit. So how many flights did Infertil manage?

Rather less than 500 planes a year it seems, no wonder Infertil couldn't make a profit.

So now we are in 2018 and the airport has been closed 4 years and the airfreight market has moved on what is different?

Background

The airfreight market has changed however the changes do not favour Manston. The airfreight tonnage has remained somewhat stable for the last 10 years at 2.3M tonnes but how it has carried has markedly changed. Tony Freudmann has committed the DCO business plan at dedicated air freighters and has stated, on more than one occasion, that they aren't interested in competing with Heathrow. So any talk about supporting UK Plc until the third runway is built is just that, talk.

Heathrow today handles 67% of all airfreight coming into the UK but 95% of that is carried in the belly of passenger planes a market that RSP have said they will not compete with. So to look at reality they will attempt to compete with the two largest airports carrying freight, that is Stanstead and the East Midlands, who between them carried just under 500,000 tonnes in 2012, equal to 21% of the total. Remember Heathrow carried 67% of the airfreight.

Now that only leaves 12% divided into every other airport in the UK.

In 2016 East Midlands carried 13%, Stanstead 9%, Manchester 4%, Gatwick 3% and Heathrow 65% Not a great deal left to share around  the 30 odd other airports.

What makes the situation even more perilous for a new player in the market is the way the market is now moving. Airfreight is up to 4x more expensive that lorry or sea freight so many freight forwarders are pulling out of the dedicated air freighter market to belly hold freight on passenger planes has meant that Freighter only movements have dropped.

In 2000 there were over 100,000 freighter Atms which declined to around 55,000 and has remained at that level whilst airfreight has remained fairly consistently around the 2,300,000 tonnes for more than 10 years. Proving that freight is transferring over to a more subsidised route. Heathrow expects this trend to continue and they expect to take more of this market in the future.

Much is made in the report done for RSP on why Manston is a good opportunity but neglects to explain how they would capture any of the Freighter only market when they were unable to capture more of the market when people actually used freighters to transport their goods and now that market has deteriorated by 40% they stand even less chance especially when Stanstead and East Midlands are spending money to expand their offering. They have a massive advantage being near the centre of the motorway network without the pinch point of the Dartford River crossing. Even Gatwick cannot compete as it is considered too far from the London Hubs.

The concentration of air freight (at Heathrow) presents a significant barrier to a newcomer trying to start from scratch in a declining market, especially when the major airports already have the cargo infrastructure in place with excess capacity still available.

addendum

More on the viability  http://promote-ramsgate.blogspot.com/2018/07/viability-of-manston.html

http://promote-ramsgate.blogspot.com/2017/08/is-reopening-manston-as-freight-hub.html

Paul Joseph Messenger

It does seem that politics and campaigning seem to merge into farce at times and the current Ramsgate KCC Councillor, Paul Joseph Messenger, seems to be proving the point. Not content to be getting a regular pasting on We Love Ramsgate Facebook page (his words) he has decided to prove the point by agreeing that Southampton Airport is in a far better geographical position than Manston ever was.

He posted this on his timeline

Actually what this author actually said to him was this:

So I repeat 1. I am not against planes 2. I am against Freudmann. A man who was struck off as a practicing solicitor for misappropriation of his clients monies. A man who has NEVER run a successful airport and a man who has somewhat dubious business practices.

So all this "support" on your page is somewhat ironic seeing as all it does is give some rather dubious individuals the opportunity to insult this author. Is this really what you want to be remembered for, inciting abusive comments?

So let us use some facts to compare Manston and Southampton airports.

History:

Southampton
In 1932 Southampton Corporation purchased the site and it became Southampton Municipal Airport. By 1935, part of the site was being used by the RAF and was briefly known as RAF Eastleigh before it became RAF Southampton in 1936. It passed back into civilian ownership in April 1946.
During the 1950s a mainstay of business for the airport was the cross-channel car ferry service operated by Silver City Airways.
Manston
Donated to the war effort in 1915 it became an RN station until being transferred to the RAF in 1917. After WW2 it was taken over by the USAAF until circa 1959 when the RAF took it back. In 1959 Silver City Airways had an enclave operating a cross channel car ferry service.

Figures

Southampton

Manston

Unfortunately Manston was bankrupted in 2005 when the money ran out (and who was in charge Anthony Freudmann)

Infrastructure

Southampton
The airport lies in Eastleigh at the junction of the M27 and M3 right next to a railhead and Parkway station. The catchment area exceeds 3M people covering Southampton, Portsmouth, Winchester, Basingstoke and numerous small towns on the South Coast. Although there is a rival airport at Bournemouth Hurn there are far more routes at Southampton.

Manston
The airport lies at the end of the Thanet Way 35 miles away from the nearest Motorway. The catchment area comprises the North Kent Coastal Towns of Medway, Whitstable, Herne Bay along with Canterbury and Ashford. At its best there were few routes for passengers and probably the most successful was KLM with its Cityhopper service(which at best was only 50% full in a 78 seat Fokker aircraft. There is no dedicated Rail Service.

In summary Southampton has been successful simply because it is better located, with better transport links, and a far bigger catchment area.
Manston simply cannot compete with everything Southampton has however despite what Messenger says This author isn't promoting Southampton over Manston because there simply is no comparison.

For all those that wonder whether airplanes are the problem then think on these taken from the garden.

To make it 100% clear Freudmann is the issue not Manston however using the position of KCC Councillor to smear someone who simply has a difference of opinion is abuse.

A modern coup

With support for Manston waning and Beau Webber and Robert John Pritchard in charge of the committee it had become apparent that the membership had lost confidence in the "Powers That Be" at the top of the Save Manston Association (SMA). This was more than apparent at Minnis Bay recently when the "Glorious Leader" set up a stall.

Some of the decisions taken by the committee have seemed very strange, with the recent support for Riveroak's Pre-Consultation taken to a new level of stupidity. Even the Planning Institute saying "don't do it" They went ahead and leading lights in the SMA being "Meeters and Greeters" and they even supplied the Security for the event. Well the results were predictable please read a sample.

 David Davidge, a security guard in his day job seems to think this is extremely funny forgetting that this has reflected badly on the SMA Committee's decision to get involved in the first place.

To digress slightly SMA was set up to try and get Manston reopened, however it wasn't set up to reopen Manston at any cost and that's what seems to have happened, and whether the recent actions will change this only time will tell.

Well what has happened with the Facebook page?

By Beau Webber | 2016-08-18 The Chairman, Officers and all but one of the Committee of the Save Manston Airport association have had their Facebook admin powers removed and most have been removed from the Save Manston Airport site.

We have confirmed that all the independent moderators (who act to keep the SMA page “clean”) have had their moderating powers removed.

The “founder” of SMA (2014) Dan Light, and the then Chairman Keith Churcher voluntarily relinquished the group (then ~3,000 members) to the management of an SMA Committee in 2014, led by Chairman Dr. Beau Webber. The legitimacy of the Committee was further established by an SGM in 2014 and an AGM in early 2016.

We have evidence that Dan Light has recently assumed dictatorial powers on the SMA site (now ~10,200 members), adding and deleting posts and members without discussion, and has now removed the Admin and other powers of the Chairman, Officers and all but one Member of the Committee of Management on the Facebook site, and has blocked the Chairman and others from access to the site. The actions taken by the Founder do not affect the powers of the Chairman, Officers or other Committee members within the governance of the Save Manston Airport ASSOCIATION.

So it looks like Keith Churcher and Dan Light have taken over the Facebook page however it seems the Real World Committee have decided that they will have to start again on FB. Now it makes you wonder which group will win out and whether either have any friends outside of their narrow world.

One of the main issues with the SMA campaign was the personal abuse directed at anyone who didn't share their viewpoint. Whether Keith and Dan can control the alleged 10000 members is also another moot point. They have so alienated TDC that it is doubtful TDC will ever support them especially if they continue to support a Freight Hub as envisaged by Tony Freudmann and Niall Lawlor. It is clear from the Pre-Consultations that Neither gentlemen want anything to do with TDC the local authority that controls the area of Manston.

Taken from replies given at the pre-consultation

·         “Niall Lawlor said that the Leader of TDC is in bed with the two guys who own the site who want to build 2500-3000 houses. He said: “Why do you think we went to the Planning inspectorate? I took it away from Thanet Council.”

 ·         “A gentleman asked how many planes they needed a day to break even. Mr Freudmann said maybe three or four. The man asked how many jobs it takes to service three or four planes a day. Tony Freudmann said: “probably about 50”. The man said: “So that's what we're talking about. The virtual destruction of Ramsgate for 50 jobs.” 

·         “I asked about night flights. RiverOak say they want to emulate East Midlands Airport and they have dozens of night flights every night. He said that he wasn’t saying that RiverOak needed night flights but that the Planning Inspectorate had asked RiverOak what they were going to say in their consultation about night flights. He said that they had to include night flights because the Planning Inspectorate said that they were mandating Heathrow, Gatwick, Stanstead, Luton and every other major airport in the South East to come up with a policy for potential night flight traffic. The Inspectorate had said: “We cannot have you involved in the DCO when we are seeking to potentially do a DCO on Heathrow and we have not asked you to do a review on night flights.” What on earth does this mean?”

“Mr Lawlor said that Thanet Council was “duplicitous” and that they had been supposed to be backing RiverOak. He said that he had told them that to their faces and that he was gladly saying it here as well.

“Mr Lawlor agreed that his aim was for a cargo airport the size of East Midlands. He then said that that's not a lucrative proposition. The lucrative proposition is a mechanised assembly line doing aircraft recycling. So it looks as if the cargo idea is just an excuse to get hold of the site. I reminded him that the application to the Planning Inspectorate is on the basis of a cargo hub airport and that a recycling unit for planes is not a national asset.”

“I asked Tony Freudmann about night flights. He said that they might need them but had no plans as yet. I asked him whether or not a lot of cargo operators say they need night flights. He agreed that they did. He also agreed that cargo operators pretty much determine the flying schedule that they want from an airport. I’m conscious that this is the man who managed to negotiate TDC into accepting unlimited, unscheduled night flights of planes as big as a 747-400. He knows he’ll need night flights if RiverOak get hold of this airport.”  

So will anything change? Well the past doesn't bode well for the future. Certainly Beau and Pritchard have done their campaign no favours and Pritchard's support for the disgrace Collins and Smith have alienated many in the campaign. (seems supporting a liar and cheat is fine)

Also treating people who have a different opinion as badly as they have done doesn't bode well for how they take it forward. The whole campaign which included death threats, raking through the past, personal abuse etc. These will all need burying because if it's same as before then neither party will be able to continue. 

Maybe it's about time for apologies to be made and the removal of the nasty element from their pages. Maybe its past time to make the group open instead of a closed hidden group. Think of Groupthink.

If anything changes then I'll ramble on further
Statement from Dan Light
 Dear members

Those who have been here for a long time will know that I was the original founder of the Save Manston Airport Facebook group way back at the start of 2014. To new members, welcome.

Today there have been several changes made to the Save Manston Airport Facebook group. This morning I removed all admin, moderators and committee when it became apparent that an alternative secret Facebook group had been set up without my knowledge. I took this decision for the good of the group as I did not like the direction my group was taking. Many of you have mentally switched off, and have felt you cannot discuss certain things for fear of getting shouted down; the campaign was starting to lose a lot of puff, there were no guts left in it left in it, and people were becoming disillusioned.

I have listened to many of you who have messaged me and spoken to me, and took this decision, to steer this whole thing back on track; at the moment we need people on our side. Unfortunately we alienated a lot of important people who could actually work with us and help us. I was not of the same opinion as others on the committee, and after countless talks falling on deaf ears this was another reason to make drastic changes. I was on my own, alienated, I wasn't listened to and when I tried to put forward my concerns I was talked down to like a child. My opinion as founder didn't matter it seems, and I also found, whilst at work, things were going on behind my back on which I had no say, which really hurt the campaign badly. I could not trust the people who were supposed to be working with me, not against me.

I understand this may come as a shock to some of you, and if you want to leave due to the changes that is your choice and I accept that. If you want to carry on being a member of John Pritchard and Beau Webber's formal Association please do so here https://www.facebook.com/groups/savemanstonairportassociation/
They are governed by a formal constitution. I feel that on a Facebook group there is no need for that and that is one of the reasons why the group lost its appeal. They are welcome to carry on with their formal campaign and I formally relinquish anything to do with it.

In the meantime this campaign will once again grow legs and get back to basics like it was at the very start. We will allow differing opinions in the group about RiverOak and also about other investors; no one will be shouted down for their views. The people now administering the group (not a committee) want to make a change for the better and carry this on in the way it was intended right from the start. There will be rules but more about that later.

I hope you do decide stay and carry on the fight with us; if you feel you can't you are more than welcome to leave and I will respect that. Let’s move forwards in saving Manston Airport.

NEVER SURRENDER!!