On Sunday 4th January 2009 and on the weekend of January 17th/18th 2009, a team of local residents, councillors and landowners took part in a co-ordinated photographic survey of Rivenhall Airfield and the site of the proposed Regional Waste Site and Incinerator.
 
Conditions were sunny with good visibility. All cameras used were digital and set to automatic exposure at 50mm or 80mm focal length. Processing was carried out using AstroArt and Photoimpression 4. No misleading manipulation of the images was carried out. The montages are "stitched" images, processing from the raw originals without attempting to change contrast or brightness, etc. The visualisations are constructed from drawing in the features of the proposed development using the colours and dimensions stated by the applicant and using scaling as per below.    
 
Photographs were taken from 10 locations around the airfield. 4 of the locations were within the grounds of, or close to, listed buildings. 9 of the locations were on, or close to, public footpaths or permissive rights of way.
 
The images will be sent in batches owing to the file sizes. They cover a range of issues including:
 
1. Scaling images - showing the actual heights of the trees and other features on the airfield.
2. Images and montages showing how the airfield looks now.
3. Using the same images and montages to produce visualisations showing what the site could look like if developed as per application ESS/37/08/BTE.
 
The scaling and visualisation exercises have been checked to make sure that dimensions stated as as accurate as possible given the image scales. This has been done using known scaled features (ie the existing Hanger (12.5m main ridge height) and radar tower (48m), a scaling pole (4m in length accurate to less than 1cm), allowing for distance scaling and the small variations in ground levels across the area.  
 
The reasons for the photographic exercise are to:
 
1. Show that the application site and surrounding area is largely open countryside and not an industrial area as the applicant has tried to suggest.
2. Show that the tree screening is lower in height and less opaque in depth than the applicant has stated.
3. Show that the impacts on the settings of listed buildings are greater than stated by the applicant.
4. Show that the entire proposal will be more visible in the landscape than stated by the applicant.
5. Show the potential visual impacts of the gas flare stack and incinerator stack at current and possible higher levels, which the applicant has not done.

6. Show the area and site from more viewing points, and from more realistic viewing points, than the applicant has done -  including from people's homes and well used local footpaths.

The Visualisations are available via the following links: