Tuesday, October 25, 2016

Tasteless - Moi?

When the current third-runway project was in its first flush of 'yes we can, no we can't' I said something rather tactless to my then Bench Chairman. I grew up near Heathrow (although I knew it as London Airport, but we shall let that pass).

To a Hayes boy, who went to school in Uxbridge, the way to the airport on spotting days went through the unprepossessing suburbs of Sipson and West Drayton. The airport brought great prosperity to the area, but its hinterland remained grim.

My then Chairman lived in Sipson, in a house that had been purchased on generous terms by the airport people, but which stands (as it still does, but for how much longer I cannot say) and is at pretty much the exact point where the airliners' wheels will meet the tarmac, with that puff of blue smoke from the tyres. So in my rather thoughtless way I ventured the opinion that most of West Drayton and Sipson would be improved by a thick layer of ferro-concrete. He sniffed and walked away.


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