A campaign group is relaunching its efforts to stop night flights at an airport – two years after the airfield closed.

No Night Flights is reviving its efforts in a bid to stop US investment business RiverOak from reopening the runway and turning it into a cargo operation.

The company is trying to gain control of the site from its present owners, which want to turn it into 2,500 homes, offices and leisure space known as Stone Hill Park.

It is using an application to the Government called a development consent order (DCO) and aims to submit a planning application by the end of the year.

Documents it submitted to the Planning Inspectorate in June said it believes 18 flights or fewer per night would be an acceptable number for residents to handle.

“This will be a noisy, polluting, over-developed space that will do nothing for the heritage of the site, nothing for the environment and nothing for the future prosperity or quality of life of local residents...” - Ros McIntyre, No Night Flights

It states the airport could carry between 500,000 to 600,000 tonnes of air freight a year by 2035, which would equate to 10,000 to 20,000 flights annually.

Campaigners, who helped to halt previous proposals for night flights at the airport, said Manston supporters living in Herne Bay and Ramsgate, under the flight path, would be more affected by the plans than when the airport was originally open.

No Night Flights organiser Ros McIntyre said: “Residents need to take off the rose-tinted glasses and recognise what this airport plan would mean for our area.

“RiverOak is not planning to reinstate what was – the plan is for a massive increase in cargo traffic.

“The RiverOak plan is for the UK’s biggest dedicated cargo airport and a huge industrial estate on what is now undeveloped land.

“This will be a noisy, polluting, over-developed space that will do nothing for the heritage of the site, nothing for the environment and nothing for the future prosperity or quality of life of local residents.”

She added: “Ramsgate and Herne Bay, at opposite ends of the flight path, are seaside towns enjoying steady regeneration as tourist destinations, bringing money and jobs back to areas that need them desperately.

“Cargo planes overhead all day and all night will kill these two towns in an instant.”

Fellow campaigner Martin O’Hara added many people were underwhelmed by RiverOak’s informal public consultation events held in July.

He said: “The favourite answer to residents’ questions seemed to be: ‘We’re not at that point yet.’”

“RiverOak understands that the reintroduction of airport operations is of concern to some residents and we remain committed to being absolutely transparent..." - Tony Freudmann, RiverOak

RiverOak project leader Tony Freudmann said: “The reference in our environmental scoping document to 18 night flights relates solely to the accepted methodology for assessing the significance of noise disturbance at night and not to any plans that we have for Manston airport.

“It is frustrating to see this method statement being so wilfully misused, causing unnecessary alarm to some members of the local community.

“RiverOak understands that the reintroduction of airport operations is of concern to some residents and we remain committed to being absolutely transparent at every stage of the DCO process to enable the community in east Kent to make informed decisions on our proposals.

“Indeed, it is for this reason that our environmental studies will be so thorough and will be published for consultation, along with all other aspects of our proposals, as soon as they are ready.”