AS a resident of Elvington I can understand Mr Starks not being too happy about the development of Elvington airfield (Letters, November 5).

I would, however, point out that, with the exception of Finningley, Elvington has the only runway capable of taking international traffic. The runways at Leeds/Bradford, Newcastle and Teesside, are respectively 2,250 metres, 2,329 metres and 2,291 metres and therefore can only be regarded as 'regional' airports.

A quick study of page 451 on Ceefax shows that most flights arriving at these airports are either internal (i.e Heathrow, Gatwick, Southampton etc) or nearby European airports with only a few from places such as Alicante, Malaga etc.

Elvington, with a runway longer than 3,000 metres, could handle world-wide traffic and with probably the biggest tourist attraction in the north of England only a few miles away, should be developed as fast as possible before we find ourselves yet again uttering the saddest phrase in the English language, "What a pity we didn't when we had the chance."

Mike Usherwood,

Mendip Close, Huntington.

Updated: 10:14 Tuesday, December 02, 2003