Heathrow 'airplot' protest supported by thousands

by Dave Keating | January 14, 2009 at 12:57 am

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The environmental activist group Greenpeace has teamed up with actress Emma Thompson and British millionaire Zav Goldsmith to buy a plot of land on the site of the planned third runway at Heathrow Airport. The plan for the third runway is still going through the government and has yet to be approved, but the group is hoping that if it is approved, they can stymie the plan by refusing to sell the land. They are now selling small bit of the land to many people in order to make forcing a sale on the land to the government exceedingly complicated.

The actress Emma Thompson, the comedian Alistair McGowan, millionaire Tory Zac Goldsmith and Greenpeace have bought a chunk of land the size of a football pitch in the middle the proposed development to expand the airport.

Greenpeace claim that ownership of the land will allow the group to resist any attempts to build the third runway, which they fear will increase the country's carbon emissions and damage efforts to slow climate change.

The organisation are allowing members of the public to become "beneficial owners" of the "Airplot" in order to register their protest and in the hope it will make it more difficult for a compulsory purchase order.

By the end of the first day, Greenpeace said it expected 10,000 people to have a stake in the plot after thousands of people logged onto a special website.