Halstead: Gliding club aim to ground concerns (From Halstead Gazette)
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Halstead: Gliding club aim to ground concerns
11:00am Sunday 3rd March 2013 in News
Ashen: Gliding club aim to ground concerns
A gliding club is hoping to put to bed quarrels over which part of an airfield it is allowed to use and when.
Essex Gliding Club, based at Ridgewell Airfield in Ashen, has applied to Braintree Council for change of use of a 70,000 square metre part of the airfield from agricultural use to use for gliders, including winch launching.
The application follows historic disagreements with the council over exactly which parts of the airfield were allowed to be used.
In 2001, an enforcement notice alleging the agricutural land was being used for gliding and calling for such use to stop was served.
In 2003, the matter arose again as a debate was raised about whether the enforcement action prevented all gliding activities on the land or whether the club could exercise certain development rights to use it for gliding purposes no more than 28 days per calendar year.
The latter was confirmed and some limited use of the land has been made ever since, but the club now hopes to remove all uncertainty.
SEE THE HALSTEAD GAZETTE FOR THE FULL STORY
