Homeowners near Leeds Bradford Airport could be given money to install air conditioning in bedrooms to help reduce noise from night-time flights.
Airport bosses said the proposed offer was a first for UK airports, with grants to replace windows also announced as part of new proposals to “modernise” its night flying rules.
Leeds Bradford Airport (LBA) had been accused of breaching a night-flight limit during the summer season by campaigners, but Leeds City Council ruled it had not breached the cap.
Its latest night flying proposals submitted to the local authority seek to replace a “decades-old movement-based system with a modern noise-based framework”.
LBA had been limited to 2,920 aircraft movements between 23:00 and 07:00 BST annually, with Group for Action on Leeds Bradford Airport (GALBA) claiming it had been breached for four successive years between 2022 and 2025.
It is now applying to condense night-time hours to 23:30 and 05:59, stating the move would bring LBA “in line with other UK airports”.
Under the latest proposals, LBA also wants to change the current air traffic movement restrictions to a quota count system.
This would allow, it said, for a modern system which “incentivises quieter, more environmentally-friendly planes”.
Vincent Hodder, LBA chief executive officer, said the proposed changes would modernise operating conditions introduced “more than three decades ago”.
“It enables us to encourage quieter, cleaner aircraft while maintaining robust environmental controls and providing meaningful support for our neighbours,” he said.
“This is about creating a stronger, more sustainable and better-connected Yorkshire for the decades ahead, this is not the ‘thousands more night flights’ some would claim.”
