The Council for the Independent Scrutiny of Heathrow Airport (CISHA)
CISHA ensures independent oversight of the way Heathrow engages with stakeholders.
The Council and its forums work with stakeholders to make progress on the issues that matter to them. We hold the airport to account and work to help ensure it is the best neighbour it can be. We fulfil the role of Airport Consultative Committee (ACC) as set out in Section 35 of the Civil Aviation Act. For more information on an ACC have a look at our ACC Fact sheet.
CISHA is responsible for ensuring constructive and effective engagement between Heathrow Airport and those who are impacted by the airport.
CISHA FESTIVE DRINKS
HOSTED BY OUR NEW CHAIR
As we approach the end of the year we thought it would be the perfect moment to gather and thank all of you for your contributions to our meetings, consultations and the work of various engagement forums.
Many of you give freely your time and although we try to spend a little time after meetings to engage informally we are going to make that the key objective of our festive drinks on Tuesday 10 December.
It will also be a great opportunity to meet Tracey Waltho, our new Chair.
In the spirit of the season we have decided to collect new, gift wrapped toys on the evening which we will give to local charity www.thetoyproject.co.uk
You are under no obligation but the CISHA team wanted to do something themselves and thought we would extend the gesture.
Please note attendance is by registration only.
Registration closes 2 December.
Registration form
CISHA Appoints New Chair: Tracey Waltho
The Council for the Independent Scrutiny of Heathrow Airport has today announced that Tracey Waltho will become its next Chair.
Tracey’s selection is the result of an extensive and competitive recruitment process that took place over the summer and saw a number of well-qualified candidates apply. Short-listing and final interview panels were drawn from a wide cross-section of Heathrow Airport stakeholders and communities, with candidates judged against a set of exacting criteria.
An accomplished public and third-sector leader Tracey brings strong leadership and oversight skills with focus on putting people and data at the heart of decision making. An influential communicator and collaborator you can read more about her by reading the full announcement.
Tracey begins her work on the 1st of November and will be embarking on a comprehensive induction where she will meet a wide range of communities and stakeholders.
Easterly Alternation Infrastructure Project
Runway alternation is a system used at Heathrow to provide noise respite to local communities during westerly operations. The system works so that the arrival runways are alternated between the northern and southern runways at 3pm local time on a weekly basis from Monday to Sunday. The alternation arrangements are in place during daytime hours for one-week cycles.
At Heathrow, easterly operations occur, on average, 28% of the time. It is wind direction that dictates the direction of Heathrow’s operations. Because of the Cranford Agreement, or more particularly now because Heathrow does not have the infrastructure that allows alternation to occur, during easterly operations all departures are from the southern runway, and all arrivals to the northern runway.
In discussion with Heathrow and Hillingdon Council CISHA was asked to set up a coordinated an independently chaired meeting with neighbouring Local Planning Authorities, so that the content of the Easterly Alternation scoping opinion can be communicated and discussed in a constructive way.
The group, chaired by Mark Izatt, has met twice - on 28th March and on the 25th June, with a third meeting scheduled. The next meeting will be held on 24th September and meeting notes will follow shortly after.
Night flight restrictions: Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted airports from October 2025
Recently the Department for Transport held a consultation - DfT: Night flight restrictions: Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted airports from October 2025. This is a critical topic to our stakeholders so we thought it only right to do a collective response although recognising that stakeholders and individuals would be submitting their own responses.
We commissioned an independent expert Ruud Ummels. Ruud is an acclaimed airport planning and operations expert so he was ideal for this task. He has led over 250 consultancy projects in over 30 countries.
We brought him to the CISHA Open Forum which was held on 18th April 2024 where he spoke and explained how he was helping, and he asked everyone to share their thoughts with him.
This opportunity to contribute to the CISHA consultation response was also promoted on our website, through our news bulletin, our forums, and on social media. All responses were collected, and an informed response was put together by Ruud and reviewed and submitted by CISHA.
We would like to thank everyone who took the time to send us their contributions, this was invaluable.
CISHA’s response
Heathrow 2.0 Sustainability Scrutiny Project: Heathrow Noise Complaints Process Review – Phase 1
In the autumn of 2023, we commissioned an independent review of how Heathrow Airport handles noise complaints following a request from the Noise and Airspace Community Forum (NACF) and as part of our ongoing scrutiny of the commitments set out in Heathrow 2.0.
Verita, an independent specialist in analysing regulated organisations, was commissioned to carry out this desk-based research. The research analysed 643,300 complaints from 2015 to 2023. This entailed interviews with those involved in the process, including representatives of Heathrow Airport, the Noise and Airspace Community Forum (NACF), and Heathrow Association for the Control of Aircraft Noise (HACAN). We would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who gave so freely of their time and insights.
This report sets out the findings of their review and six recommendations identifying ways in which Heathrow Airport could make improvements to their complaints handling process. The report was discussed at a meeting of the NACF, and CISHA has invited further community feedback.
Resources have been allocated for a phase two to be commissioned should feedback suggest that a second phase would be valuable. Those impacted by aircraft noise please voice your opinions and email info@cisha.org
Heathrow’s response to the recommendations
Heathrow has seen this report and has responded to the recommendations. Let us know what you think of their response via email info@cisha.org
2023: A YEAR IN REVIEW
The CISHA Annual Report is one of the ways in which we provide transparency on our activities and generate engagement and discussion with our stakeholders and the wider community. In the interests of sustainability, the report is distributed digitally.
CISHA’s membership includes six forums that represent stakeholders in and around Heathrow Airport
