Heathrow Expansion Consultation: Response Guide

 

Heathrow’s consultation closes at 23:59 on 22 December 2026. It is a chance to challenge the detail of the scheme before Heathrow applies for a Development Consent Order in 2027. Whatever your view of a third runway, the plans as they stand leave the communities that would bear the impact with too little information and too few guarantees.

 

What Heathrow is proposing

 

• Flights rising from just over 475,000 a year to up to 756,000, with up to 25,000 extra before the new runway opens.
• 757 homes demolished: all 283 in Longford, 448 in Harmondsworth, 16 in Colnbrook and 10 in Sipson. Every other home in Harmondsworth, Sipson, Harlington, Colnbrook, Poyle and Brands Hill falls in the Wider Property Offer Zone (WPOZ).
• A 3,500m runway with the M25 in a tunnel beneath it, and seven rivers and watercourses diverted, five of them run together under the runway.
• Construction lasting until around 25 years after consent, with 24-hour, seven-day working proposed where required.
• Two new car parks (“parkways”) with 33,500 spaces, up to five freight sites, and a relocated Immigration Removal Centre in Hatton.

 

What the consultation does not tell us

• Where the new flight paths would go. How loud it would be or how frequent communities would have flights overhead.
• How big the Community Compensation Fund would be.
• How much carbon will be emitted from extra flights and how this might be mitigated.
• Binding targets for local jobs and apprenticeships.
• How public transport improvements will be delivered and who will pay for them.
• How local road networks will be impacted.

 

How to use this guide

• Answer the questions that matter to you, in your own words. Personal responses carry more weight than copied text.
• Say where you live and how the plans would affect you, your home and your family.
• Ask for specifics: numbers, dates and binding commitments.
• Refer answers to specific page numbers and documents where possible.
• Page numbers referenced in this guide refer to the main consultation document.

 

 

 

 

Consultation Questions 

 

Q1 – Scheme design and changes since 2019

• Heathrow says the runway and airfield proposals “remain unchanged” since 2019 (p.23). The main changes are smaller car parks. Ask why the runway’s position was not revisited to save homes from being destroyed.
• Seven watercourses would be diverted, and five combined in a covered corridor beneath the runway, where Heathrow admits low light will limit planting.
• New rail links are only “allowed for” if they come forward later. The scheme should not rely on rail access that nobody has committed to build.
• Ask Heathrow to publish the number of homes in the Wider Property Offer Zone (WPOZ), area by area.
• Hidden land take. Stanwell’s local area document says no properties are affected, yet its maps show homes and businesses “needed for the airport’s expansion”. Ask which, and why they are not in the Compulsory Purchase Zone (CPZ).
• Bedfont, Hatton Cross and Feltham would absorb the Immigration Removal Centre (up to four storeys behind a 5m wall), freight sites and a wider Southern Perimeter Road. Ask whether other sites were considered.

 

Q2 – Construction

• Construction would run in phases until around 25 years after consent, with most airfield works done only in the late 2040s (pp.48–52). That is a generation living beside a building site.
• Heathrow proposes 24-hour, seven-day working, including bank holidays, “where required” (p.46). Hours would be cut only if effects are “unacceptable”, a term never defined. Normal hours should be the default near homes, with exceptions approved by the local council.
• At peak there would be about 4,000 loaded lorry trips a day, each with a return. Call for legally enforceable caps on lorry numbers, fixed routes away from villages and schools, and a binding minimum share of materials by rail.
• Longford residents would live beside a crushing and screening site before being bought out. Harmondsworth faces stockpiles up to 25m high and an asphalt plant for about ten years, with Holloway Lane its only road access. Ask for a published assessment of dust, noise and emergency access.
• Spoil would go to Kingsmead Quarry near Wraysbury for most of the programme. Ask how many lorries, on which routes and for how long?
• Schools, nurseries, open space and community halls should be replaced before anything is demolished, as a legal requirement.
• Publish who qualifies for the Temporary Home Relocation Scheme during noisy works.
• Heathrow gives two peak workforce figures: 21,500 in the EDF and 22,500 a day in the transport document. Which one is right, and where would non-local workers live?

 

 

 

Q3 – Operating an expanded airport

 

• With one runway in “mixed mode”, ask how many hours of respite each community would get under each alternation option before choosing between them.
• The proposed night ban runs from 23:00 to 05:30, just six and a half hours, and delayed flights could run until 01:00 under the “recovery period” (p.85). The local booklets give no night hours at all. Call for at least seven hours (23:00–06:00), rising to eight, with penalties on late running.
• Heathrow says the 25,000 extra “early growth” flights would have no significant noise effects. Ask for the evidence and make them conditional on insulation and the noise envelope being in place first.
• Flight paths will be designed later by UKADS. Iver, Datchet, Wraysbury, Old Windsor and Stanwell Moor cannot judge the impact at all, and Cranford’s booklet says nothing about changed flying patterns overhead. Heathrow must consult again once communities know whether they will be overflown.

 

Q4 – Surface access

• Heathrow’s own figures show 44,000 more vehicle trips a day than in 2024 (+28%), rising from 155,500 to 199,500, and 45% more than without expansion (p.92).
• The policy pledge of “no increase in airport-related traffic” has been weakened to “strive for”. Restore it as a binding limit under Environmentally Managed Growth (EMG), with growth paused if it is breached.
• No new rail links are included, although the 2018 targets assumed them. Passenger public transport use reaches only 52% against a 55% target, and staff car trips rise 5% instead of halving. Committed rail links should be a condition of the new runway opening.
• Demand rises by more than 50% on Heathrow Express and the nearest sections of the Elizabeth and Piccadilly lines, relying on an unfunded Piccadilly line upgrade. Ask who pays to relieve crowding.
• Bus growth of 50% depends on TfL and operators who plan one to two years ahead, while dozens of local routes would be rerouted. Ask for funded, guaranteed services at current or better frequencies.
• 33,500 new parking spaces next to Sipson, Harlington and Stanwell undercut the public transport target.
• Booklets list traffic hotspots (12 in Stanwell, 11 in Bedfont) with no volumes, and Sipson and Old Windsor get traffic calming while being told local roads are unchanged. Ask for forecast flows on named roads.
• The monitoring strategy (TRIMMS) fixes rat-running only after it appears. Mitigation should be funded up front.

 

Q5 – Noise

• Past noise reductions came from quieter aircraft. Adding up to 280,000 flights a year risks wiping out those gains. The noise envelope must lock in further reductions, not share out increases.
• Lack of clarity on respite. Will existing periods be protected? How will communities newly impacted by noise be offered respite?
• Not one local booklet gives a noise level, contour map or count of people affected.
• Thresholds should reflect the latest government funded research (ANNE and ANAS) or be in line with WHO guideline levels of 45 dB Lden (day) and 40 dB Lnight (night).
• A £3,000 contribution will not pay for proper acoustic glazing. Fully funded insulation should be the norm.
• Road traffic noise is expected in Colnbrook, Harmondsworth, Harlington, Longford, Poyle, Sipson, Stanwell, Stanwell Moor, Bedfont and Cranford. These areas need protection too.
• Dozens of schools, nurseries, surgeries, a hospice and places of worship are only promised assessment “case by case”. Every affected school should be insulated to the classroom standard (BB93) before extra flights begin.

 

Q6 – Air quality

• Every local area document says pollution would stay “below the Air Quality Objectives”, but none publishes a single figure and the Environmental Impact Assessment is unfinished. Conclusions should not come before evidence.
• Heathrow measures itself against UK objectives, which are far weaker than the WHO 2021 guidelines (10 µg/m³ for NO2 and 5 µg/m³ for PM2.5). Limits under EMG should track WHO levels.
• The biggest rises in NO2 would be in Harlington, Harmondsworth and Sipson, with increases also in Cranford and Poyle. Ask for figures at named schools and homes, and what extra protection would follow.
• Stanwell, Iver and Old Windsor are told effects are “negligible”, in Stanwell’s case beside a 20,000-space car park and a lorry park. Ask for the evidence.
• Heathrow has monitored ultrafine particles since 2017 but there are no limits on them. It should publish the data and fund independent monitoring in nearby communities.
• An independent body should have power to stop growth if limits are breached, not just receive a “mitigation plan”.
• Dust and odour from digging up old landfill would be “controlled” by a code of practice with no limits, monitoring sites or public reporting.

 

Q7 – Environment, heritage and carbon

• Nature. Eighteen local wildlife sites lie within the works area. Part of Poyle Meadow in the Staines Moor SSSI would be lost, and the Colne Valley wildlife corridor broken by the runway. Longford Moor, parts of Harmondsworth Moor, three allotment sites and local playing fields would go. Replacement habitat must be local, measurable and in place before losses occur.
• Heritage. The whole of Longford Village Conservation Area and all its listed buildings would be lost, along with the southern part of Harmondsworth Conservation Area. The setting of the Grade I listed Great Barn and St Mary’s Church would be permanently changed.
• Carbon. Heathrow already emits 19.4 MtCO2e a year, about 4.8% of UK emissions, and admits likely significant adverse effects (pp.114–115). It says over 99% of its carbon footprint is outside its control. EMG needs a binding carbon limit tied to UK carbon budgets that includes non-CO2 warming, with growth stopped if it is breached.
• Flooding. Groundwater in Colnbrook and Poyle already causes flooding, and large flood storage areas are planned around Iver. Ask for the flood modelling, who is liable if homes flood, and who maintains the storage areas.

 

Q8 – Health

• Heathrow accepts that displacing residents from Harmondsworth, Longford and parts of Sipson and Poyle will harm physical and mental health (p.132).
• The wellbeing service covers only the CPZ, Harmondsworth and Sipson. Extend it to the whole WPOZ, Harlington, Poyle and Stanwell, to tenants, and for as long as the works last.
• The health assessment uses WHO thresholds. Mitigation should be designed to meet them too.
• Measures for vulnerable groups are still “ongoing”. Publish them, with baseline health monitoring and funding for local GP capacity, before any application. Harlington Hospice and local surgeries need specific protection.

 

Q9 – Property policies

• Families left in limbo. CPZ owners can agree a sale now, but cannot complete until consent is granted and Heathrow decides to proceed, in 2029 at the earliest (p.140). Anyone in the zones who wants to sell now should be able to.
• The WPOZ: forced out in all but name. These homes are “not expected to be required”, yet they would sit beside runway works, road schemes and 24-hour construction; all of Harlington is in the zone. Heathrow’s own table directs WPOZ owners to the neighbouring property schemes rather than the owner-occupier policy (p.141). They must get the same terms as the CPZ, with the option to sell now, and those who stay need full insulation and wellbeing support.
• Gaps in the boundary. Edges of Poyle, Stanwell Moor, Cranford and Bedfont face major works but get no property protection. A wider property value guarantee is needed, without a hardship test.
• Communities split. As neighbours leave and properties empty, those who remain will lose shops, schools and support networks.
• Undefined offers. The policies are still draft, and the “enhanced loss payment” and disturbance payment are not quantified. Confirm at least market value plus an uncapped 25%, stamp duty and fees, with valuation disputes settled independently.
• Tenants. Fixed payments are not enough. Private and social tenants need guaranteed local rehousing at comparable rents.

 

Q10 – Relocation support

• The relocation service will not give independent legal, financial or valuation advice (p.142). Heathrow should pay for advisers of the resident’s choosing.
• Like-for-like homes nearby, with the option for neighbours to move together.
• A named caseworker, removal and adaptation costs, school places and GP registration sorted before the move.
• Extra help for older, disabled and vulnerable residents, and no gagging clauses.
• Harmondsworth Primary, Wonderland and Littlebrook nurseries, Landon School (for children with special educational needs), the community centre and the Universal Pentecostal Church have no secured replacement or opening date. Each should open before the old one closes.
• Launch the property policies and relocation service now, not after consultation.

 

Q11 – Community Compensation Fund

• No size. Policy cites £50 million a year, or £750 million over 15 years, but Heathrow now calls this merely “indicative”. It should be a minimum, index-linked from its mid-2010s price base and paid for as long as the expanded airport operates.
• Who pays. Heathrow favours a passenger levy, which grows with traffic and so raises little in the construction years when Heathrow says need is greatest. Business rates retention would take money from council services. Heathrow should pay from its own revenues from consent, with any levy on top.
• Not a substitute for mitigation. The fund would cover “unforeseen” effects that Heathrow’s own assessment missed. Heathrow should fix those as extra mitigation, not from community money. Grants must not replace council or Heathrow Community Trust spending.
• Real independence. Heathrow would establish and administer the board, and the scrutiny panel has no stated powers. Residents should hold a board majority, Heathrow should have no veto, and the fund should be secured in the DCO.
• Fix the rules. As written, a project must pass all four gateway tests, although two are alternatives, so almost nothing would qualify. Publish draft funding area maps now, collect baseline quality-of-life data before construction, and do not make communities re-prove harm at every five-year review.

 

Q12 – Further comments

• Too much is missing to give informed feedback: flight paths, noise contours, pollution figures, aviation carbon, fund size, insulation thresholds and job targets.
• The material contains errors. Bedfont’s air quality section is copied from Colnbrook’s; Iver’s booklet keeps an editing note; Longford’s heritage page is marked “WIP”; the transport document says the DCO will be sought “in 2017”; the EDF cites a table that does not exist; the fund document contains placeholders.
• There are more than 1,200 pages to read in eight weeks before Christmas, and four local events fall in December, Stanwell’s ten days before the deadline.
• The Planning Inspectorate examines whether consultation was adequate. Say clearly that this one was incomplete.
• The government’s Heathrow policy statement has not yet been approved by Parliament. Heathrow should publish the missing detail and consult again before applying.
• Test the economic benefits. Heathrow forecasts 24,800 extra onsite jobs by 2055, below the Government’s 37,000–45,000 and only about 6,900 more than today. Heathrow backs cutting the apprenticeship target from 10,000 to 5,000 broader “pathways”, from about 99 new apprentices a year now. Ask for binding targets for local jobs, apprenticeships and local business spend, secured in the DCO, with consequences if missed.

Questions to put to Heathrow

 

Ask these at consultation events or include them in your response:

 

General

1. How many homes are in the CPZ and the WPOZ, village by village?
2. Will WPOZ owners get exactly the same terms as CPZ owners, and can they sell now?
3. When will flight paths be published, and will you consult again once they are?
4. How many hours a day of 24-hour construction would happen near homes, and where?
5. How many local residents would get permanent jobs, and will that be a binding target?
6. What is the minimum size of the Community Compensation Fund, and how long will it last?
7. What happens to people who have agreed a sale if the scheme is delayed or abandoned?

 

Homes and property

8. Which properties near Stanwell Moor are “needed for the airport’s expansion”, and why are they not in the CPZ?
9. Will people in Poyle, Stanwell Moor, Cranford and Bedfont get a property value guarantee?

 

Noise and flights

10. What noise levels (LAeq day and night, Lmax and events over 65 dB) are forecast for my street, and why are there no contour maps?
11. Which night flight restrictions will be legally binding in the DCO, and from which year?
12. How many hours of respite will each community get from runway alternation?
13. What are the insulation thresholds, and will every affected school be insulated to BB93 before extra flights begin?

 

Construction

14. Who decides when 24-hour working is “unacceptable”, and what is the trigger?
15. What enforceable caps on lorry numbers, routes and hours will apply in each village?
16. Is the peak workforce 21,500 or 22,500, and where will non-local workers live?

 

Air quality and health

17. What NO2 and PM2.5 levels are forecast at named schools and homes, against UK objectives and WHO guidelines?
18. Will you issue a corrected Bedfont booklet with its own air quality findings, and extend the consultation?
19. Will ultrafine particles be independently monitored and published?

 

 

Carbon

20. What are total CO2 and non-CO2 emissions from flights at 150 million passengers, and how do they fit the seventh carbon budget?
21. What is the carbon limit under EMG, who enforces it, and can capacity be withheld?
22. What are the construction carbon emissions, including the M25 tunnel?

 

Roads and public transport

23. Why has the “no increase in airport-related traffic” pledge become “strive for”?
24. What traffic is forecast on my local roads, in numbers? Why do Sipson and Old Windsor need traffic calming if roads are “unchanged”?
25. If the 55% public transport target is missed, is growth paused?
26. Who funds 50% more buses, for how long, and will rerouted local services keep their frequency?
27. How do staff car trips rising 5% meet the policy aim of halving them?

 

Community Compensation Fund

28. Why is direct funding from Heathrow’s revenues not the main option, and would a levy be added to regulated airport charges?
29. How will the fund be paid for in the early years if levy income builds only after the runway opens?
30. How will the fund be legally secured, and will Heathrow have a vote or veto on the board?
31. Why should community money pay for “unforeseen” effects rather than Heathrow funding extra mitigation?

 

Jobs and economy

32. Why is your local jobs forecast well below the Government’s, and which figure will targets be based on?
33. Do you accept the Government’s negative net present value? If not, which inputs do you dispute?
34. What is the year-by-year apprenticeship trajectory, and why do you support halving the target?
35. Which economic commitments will be secured as DCO requirements, and which stay voluntary?

 

 

How to respond

• Online: heathrow.com/expansion
• Email: expansionconsultation@heathrow.com
• Post: FREEPOST EXPANSION CONSULTATION (no stamp needed)
• Help or printed copies: 0800 307 7996
• Copy your response to your MP and local councillors.