According to the piece, headlined 'Big Plans For Loss-Making Manston Airport', Scotland's second wealthiest woman hopes to turn her recently acquired acreage of Kentish concrete into 'an environment where new partners are attracted to do business'. Which to my uninitiated ear (that's the left one) sounds like an invitation for everyone to chuck the keys to their knackered old jumbos into a bowl and take pot luck.
She continues: 'I hope that with the co-operation of our neighbours and the wider community of Kent blah blah blah the best chance possible of having a successful and vibrant airport.'
Well, good luck with that Ann! I do hope you mean that, unlike the previous head-in-sand policy adopted by Infratil, you will enter into some kind of meaningful dialogue with the 40,000 people your planes will be flying a few feet over!
Any-old-hoo, to show she means business she's changed the name of her holding company to Manston Skyport Ltd and appointed airport 'turnaround specialist' Alastair Welch to lead her team at Manston. Presumably he'll be the one with the hi-vis vest and ping-pong bats.
Of course, this may leave current RAF London Kent Manston Margate Tracey Emin Chas 'n' Dave Maggie Thatcher Schipol Skyport Poundland International Airport CEO, Smiler Buchanan, feeling as if he's been left with the spare set of keys at an environment where new partners are attracted to do business. Especially as Welch was the MD who presided over the hugely successful take-off of Southend Airport over the last six years.
Happy landings!
Click here to read the full article on the Global Airport Cities website.
Click here for Alastair Welch interview just weeks before he baled out of Sarfend.
45 comments:
Cue 200 more comments from the local nutter(s)...
Hmmm. I hadn't thought of that. Nutters beware! I am on nutter alert!
I think you were right the first time, 9:18, with just nutter!
Why not Tom Hanks Airport following on from your last post. Now that has a good ring to it.
I like it. I like it a lot!
Manston has been a wonderful success through pollution and removing the monitors. Continuing that as part of the £1 sale should be marvellous too!
To that think an airport on the water supply gets through the CAA and Environment Agency planning process?
And the council remove the monitors.
ALastair is carrying the can now with Buchanan:
"in Southend my prime role is to make sure that aircraft operation and passenger operation are safe and secure. I am the licence holder of the aerodrome so that means I am accountable under the Aviation Act for a number of things relating to the safety of aircraft, to fire services at the airport, the air traffic control at the airport and so on. While the fire fighters and air traffic controllers are individually licensed I have to make sure that we comply with the rules and regulations that apply to what we are doing. In addition, from the point of view of security, we obviously have obligations under the law for passenger security, as well as other matters, so there is a very strong legal compliance side to my role. I also need to make sure that the airfield is safe to operate and while I delegate to staff to look after that, it is my responsibility."
Tap water in flames. Yikes! Thank goodness there are NO problems at Manston or Thor eh?
http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/oddnews/family-discovers-their-faucet-water-is-flammable-191347861.html?vp=1
3 more comments in a row from the same IP address! Why doesn't this guy stand for election instead of just posting anonymous comments everywhere if he's serious about all this?
Manston is a success and not polluted though, right?
And you truly believe that posting countless anonymous comments on blogs will change things, right?
New name for Manston.
Poundland of course.
(Unless of course its already been taken.)
it has been a quiet few days at sincerity, Tim has been on Twitter all the time instead posting TFC tweets twitter.com/timg33
I would love Manston succeed as an airport, if only to see the look on the face of the resident nutter.
Ann Gloag has set him loose.
Thanks for the link to Tim's twitter John.
Yep, that was definitely Holyer. 10:11 and 10:14 are the same IP ADDRESS!!!
Tim's Twitter @timg33 details some of the corruption and pollution incidents, as does his blog. Why have our councillors remained silent and done nothing?
There is no way that anyone, apart from possibly me, could tell which IP address any of these comments are from. Stay off my blog, you nutter!
I am 10:11 .. but I am not John. It was my first and only posting of a comment so far on this subject.
You must be Epps then 10:48, so fascinated with Tim and the Manston pollution...
That's funny, the wife gave me a Tom Hanks in bed this morning.
Let's see what happens at Manston over the coming months. Nothing is ever straightforward at our beloved local Skyport.
Anon 11:29, I have already told you that I comment under my own name. If I should want to say anything about Tim, though why I might escapes me, I will do so openly. Accept the fact that Tim's notoriety extends well beyond just me and John Holyer.
Stagecoach Annie is in the adoption racket, down in Kenya:
http://www.kenyachildrenshome.org.uk/what_we_do/adoption_society
Kenya has a reputation as an international child trafficking hub:
http://www.gvnet.com/humantrafficking/Kenya.htm
Hey, isn't that where Saudi Cargo flies in from?
https://arabracismislamofascism.wordpress.com/tag/sex-slaves/
You see William you're at it again with your Tim obsession...
Who's Tim?
"Hey, isn't that where Saudi Cargo flies in from?"
No, it comes in from Amsterdam.. www.saudiacargo.com/downloads/2013/oct/Winter%20Freighter%20Schedule%20effective%2027%20Oct%202013%20-%20Europe.pdf
In the government's NIP (National Infrastructure Plan) announced today nothing was mentioned about a new Manston Railway Station and track improvements in the area. Unlike Gatwick railway station which gets £50 millions for improvements and improvements to the Brighton line which just happens to go through Gatwick.
So much for the Transports ministers visit to Manston earlier this year.
I wonder why Squelch is leaving Southend?
Anon 7.37, keep up to date he left Southend in July --
“Alastair has decided that, with the redevelopment of the airport all-but complete, the time is now right for him to move on to new challenges."
That schedule is for outbound from Europe, 4:09, how about inbound?
The local rags reported that perishables are to be flown in from Nairobi, I assume there must be some substance to that report?
I Googled for you..
www.routes-news.com/on-the-move/3-on-the-move/1669-alastair-welch-quits-southend
""Alastair has decided that, with the redevelopment of the airport all-but complete, the time is now right for him to move on to new challenges," said Tinkler.
Welch has overhauled the airport, which now has a longer runway, a new railway station and hotel, a new passenger terminal and control tower, added Tinkler."
I'm flying long haul tomorrow, a bit if winter sun. I live in thanet. I'm flying 8 hours, paying a bloody fortune for my holiday, and to make the journey easier, I'm tying in my car parking with an overnight stay at Gatwick. As I bought a package, flying via Schipol from Amsterdam never came into the equation.
This is the reality of air travel, not the fantasy world many believe in who comment on here.
Manston will never have the choice of destinations I want, and I aim to spend as little time in the airport as possible. When I'm in an airport I want nice facilities. I also only want to spend a limited amount time in the air.
Manston schipol doesn't do it for me nor anyone else I've spoken to with kids, the obvious drawback being you are elongating the travelling agony.
Now if i was a decaying fish, why would I want to stink out lovely heathrow. That's the sort of traffic manston is likely to attract. Wake up peoples, freight is coming.
Welch left the airport in May: sacked or resigned?
Cargolux fly vegetables and flowers in to Manston from Nairobi: don't know about Saudi Cargo but all Middle East cargo ailrines have security problems after the cargo bomb a year ago.
"That schedule is for outbound from Europe, 4:09, how about inbound?"
You're right, meant to put the inbound. Manston not on there anyway as it goes to AMS first before coming here.
Track it on Flightradar24.com live twice a week,(later today)Flight code SVA933 is for inbound flights to here.
Meant to add the load is indeed perishables but it goes via AMS first, so isn't a direct flight here 'full of trafficked child slaves'
Amsterdam will offload those there first ;-)
Anon 0650,
I have transited through Schiphol. In my experience it is pleasant and comfortable airport. I have also used Gatwick many times and two of its hotels. Of course if one lived in Thanet and flew from Manston there would be no need for hotels and car parking. Also, statistically the less one travels by road the safer the journey.
Enjoy your holiday. Where are you going to?
Well, perhaps we need to let Alastair Welch know in advance, in no uncertain terms, that if he turns a blind eye to child trafficking on his watch, it will mean the end to his high-flying career.
So Saudi Cargo goes via Schipol and KLM goes via Schipol. And Cargolux goes via Ostend or Luxembourg.
These are the shortest and most polluting and unprofitable and unneccessary air journeys possible aren't they?
Where are the horses flown in from?
Sad to see this once excellent site almost totally hijacked to the tune of as many as four out of five comments by the same mindless, unsubstantiated nonsense. It is hardly surprising that so many who ran blogs or commented on them have fallen by the wayside.
Schipol is lovely but Manston is a dump. And flights between the two are expensive and lengthy.
Cargo and night flights was always the aim for Manston with a compliant population bamboozled into accepting it and the safety measures removed by TDC and Infratil to push it through.
Statistically cancer goes up around airports John so with increased flights and pollution, statistically, the main journey for all Thanet people would be to the cancer ward.
The extra costs of hospitals, cancer drugs mortuaries and so on would need to be costed and included in the development cost.
.. from today.. landed around 2pm
http://s27.postimg.org/92i89zij7/Saudi_AMS_MSE.png
Perhaps they could name it after our local aviation expert and Conservative Councillor for Westgate? Now that would be fitting.
The Tory Party is the political home of entrepreneurs, sponsorship and all that jazz, so…
Perhaps his close political buddies - the Thanet North Member of Parliament and his partner/office side-kick - could fund the toilet suite and be immortalised by its being dubbed the "Roger and Shmoozy Gale Break-Wind Facility".
The bus link to the nearest rail-head could be sponsored by Air-Ads, with passengers forced to wear goggles and white scarves when travelling in the open-top charabancs.
And the terminal could have a glossy cocktail bar called "Pacific North Western" with a full 180 degree of the runway. Might cost a packet to get the full works from the bar tender though.
Just some idea, Mrs Gloag.
The answer of course William is comment moderation. That's why Thanet Life doesn't have these comments, and bothy Michael and ECR turn on comment moderation when they occasionally see sense.
"These are the shortest and most polluting and unprofitable and unneccessary air journeys possible aren't they?"
I assume not or the freight forwarders wouldn't run them would they?
When our mate flies out to Thailand on 'business' I assume it is ok to 'cancerize' the locals at Heathrow or Gatwick?
In 'Big plans for loss-making Manston Airport, bought for £1 it is said that "Plans to utilise Manston as a reliever airport for London airports were submitted to the Airports Commission as part of its review of airport capacity solutions. A spokeswoman for Manston Skyport advised that Gloag was not involved in these plans but could not confirm whether they would be retained under her ownership." Truly right and I agree. Gatwick airport parking
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