A GBP1 BILLION plan to expand Edinburgh Airport is in jeopardy after the local authority raised serious concerns about the risk of flooding and increased road traffic.

Consultation on the proposed expansion was meant to end on August 31, but it has been extended by two months after the City of Edinburgh Council spurned the plans as "flawed".

Transport and environmental campaigners have also attacked the plans as "wild" and "reckless".

BAA, the private company that operates Edinburgh Airport, predicts that the number of passengers will increase from eight million a year at present to as many as 26 million in 2030. To cope with the rising demand, it is planning new departure lounges, new checkin desks and a new two-mile runway.

The plan also envisages a fivefold increase in long-stay car parking. The total area of the airport will double to 770 hectares, evicting the neighbouring Royal Highland Show at Ingliston.

"The plan is flawed because it doesn't take proper account of flood risks and it relies too heavily on transport by private car, " Edinburgh's planning convener, Trevor Davies, told the Sunday Herald.

A report by council officials points out that the expansion would occupy a large part of the natural flood plain of the Gogar Burn. Along with the increased run-off from the new car parks, this would pose "a high risk of flooding", the report warns. "The plan should not be approved without addressing this issue."

BAA's masterplan would also generate a massive increase in car use, which would clog up the roads, the report says.

The company has failed to recognise that the airport cannot grow without major improvements in public transport, it argues.

Because of Edinburgh's objections, BAA has offered to extend the deadline for the council's formal response to the plan by two months, to the end of October. In return, the council has agreed not to submit its formal response until discussions have taken place between the council and the company to try to resolve their differences.

There have so far been more than 300 responses to the consultation on BAA's plans for Edinburgh Airport.

Government agencies, local authorities, companies and environmental groups have all made their views known.

The Scottish Association for Public Transport said government predictions of a rapid increase in air traffic were unrealistic. "Present high growth is not compatible with the UK sustainable development strategy, nor is aviation growth essential to maintain present economic growth rates, " it argued.

A similar point was made in a joint submission from the environmental groups TRANSform Scotland and Friends of the Earth. Greenhouse gas emissions from aircraft were "uniquely damaging" to the climate, they claimed.

"The plans for expanding Edinburgh Airport are environmentally reckless and we will strongly resist them, " said the chief executive of Friends of the Earth Scotland, Duncan McLaren.

"They would undermine action to tackle Scotland's climate emissions. And they would have hugely damaging impacts for Edinburgh and the surrounding area, including more local air pollution, noise and disruption."

BAA stressed the need to strike the right balance between economic growth and the impacts on the environment and local communities.

Aviation should be included in European Union plans to reduce climate emissions by adopting a trading scheme, the company said.

"We will examine carefully the comments of people around the airport, and of organisations such as TRANSform Scotland and Friends of the Earth, to better understand their perspectives, " said BAA Scotland's communications director, Malcolm Robertson.

He disputed Edinburgh's accusation that the company had failed to take proper account of the need for better public transport. BAA supported tram and rail links, backed the bus service and had favoured the city's doomed congestion-charging scheme.

"We contend that there is no private company in Edinburgh doing more than BAA to promote public transport in the capital, " Robertson said.

The company's words, however, will not comfort the Green Party's environment spokesman, Mark Ruskell MSP. "Wild airport expansion plans such as this would wipe out the pollution savings we are making by investing in renewable energy schemes, " he said. "The air industry seems to believe that it has greater rights than anyone else to pollute. It obviously doesn't see the irony of its proposed expansion on to flood plains made vulnerable by climate change."

According to Ruskell, the planned Edinburgh Airport expansion highlights the contradictions inherent in the government's attempts to tackle climate change. He is also critical of the Scottish Executive's failure to commit itself to a Scotland-wide target for cutting pollution.

In a recent response to the Scottish parliament's environment committee report on dealing with climate change, ministers promised targets "in areas of devolved responsibility", but said a national target was "not currently feasible".

Ruskell is currently consulting on a parliamentary bill about climate targets.

"Only by having statutory national targets for the UK and Scotland, backed by a legal requirement on ministers to take action, can we join up policies and make sure each and every sector of our society is pulling its weight to tackle this terrible crisis head-on, " he said.

rob. edwards@sundayherald. com

www. edinburghairport. com

www. edinburgh. gov. uk

www. rhass. org. uk

www. transformscotland.org. uk

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Is the civic and environmental price of a bigger Edinburgh Airport too high to pay?

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