The airfield at Jurby which the government wants zoned as a future replacement for Ronaldsway as the island’s national airport is a protected wildlife habitat.

David Bellamy, Head of Conservation and Land at Manx Wildlife Trust has written to Jurby Parish Commissioners ahead of the public meeting on August 12 to point out the discrepancy of the former airfield site at Jurby being both zoned as a legally protected Area of Special Scientific Interest and also as a new national airport.

He said this would see a new runway constructed to the south of current disused one and at 2.64km in length, it would be roughly twice the length.

He wrote : ‘We have been receiving a large amount of queries and concern from members of the public after we first highlighted the ambiguity within the draft Area Plan that the former airfield was both correctly zoned as an ASSI (which has had legal protection since 2004 under Section 27 of the Wildlife Act 1990) and also confusingly zoned as a new national airport, which the Cabinet Office confirmed to the inquiry inspector was an active government project.

‘Ahead of your forthcoming parishioners’ meeting, Manx Wildlife Trust wish for all Jurby commissioners to have the full facts about the existing legal protection of the site’s nationally important ecology.’

The site is a stronghold for breeding skylarks as well as a breeding habitat for linnets and curlew - which are all on the Manx and UK red-list of threatened species.

Mr Bellamy told iomtoday that he discovered the plans for a future runway when he raised at the Area Plan public inquiry what he thought was a mapping error.

The Environmental Constraints map showed the former airfield site at Jurby as a designated nature reserve but the Infrastructure Constraints map showed it zoned for a new runway.

‘It can’t be both,’ he said, adding ‘that the purpose of the plan is to remove ambiguity from land zonation’.

He said a Cabinet Office official confirmed to the planning inspector that the proposal for a new national airport was an active government project. ‘It is fair to say that the inspector appeared astounded. He was not aware of this,’ he said.

‘The former airfield has been protected as a nature reserve since 2004 owing to its disused status. A nature reserve is, by definition, reserved for nature. It’s also a  formal UNESCO Biosphere Core Area forming one of just 25 sites legally protected for nature on our island.’