Andy spotted this interesting planning application at Dalton Barracks.
The application seeks to use the Dalton Barracks airfield to film ‘A high end and prestigious production’ making use of the control tower and runway for period planes. The planes will not be flying, only taxiing. Other locations on site will also be used for filming including a blue screen area and welfare units for cast and crew. This is for a television production, with about 300 people at the peak of filming, and some of the people will use local hotels and B&Bs.
Site preparation starts in January 2021 until April then approximately 50 days of filming and the striking of the set to start late November. There would be no public access during filming.
Last year’s Abingdon Air and Country show was cancelled because of the pandemic. They were hoping to run the event on Saturday, 11th September 2021 at Dalton Barracks, but as we all know planning anything like that is difficult currently.
(The two pictures are from the Abingdon Air and Country Show)
It’s almost certainly “Masters of the Air”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masters_of_the_Air
Great, another film/tv series where the Americans win WW2 , singlehanded, with no allies to get in the way and spoil the nonstop Hollywood heroics.
This will also cause a major disruption a a huge number of traditional / casual users of the airfield, many of whom have been holding their events for over 25 years. A large proportion of these are charity fund-raising events relating to local causes and who will suffer directly from activities not being able to take place. These would cause all sorts of hardships, especially important given that they have not been able to hold any other fund-raising events for almost 12 months.
Some of these uses (such as the air show and country fair) also attract a large number of visitors who stay, shop and eat locally. Any thoughts of the income derived from this project will fall far short of what would be lost. Film and TV people will either stay on-site, or opt for staying in the larger towns and cities, such as Oxford, Newbury or Swindon.
Whilst this is an MoD location, it is also an area which could be considered as being ‘a local amenity’ for dog-walkers, joggers and general exercise. There will be fully restricted access to this valuable open space, enforced for up to 12 months rather than just periods of a few days spread throughout the year.
Film sets are very destructive and rarely leave areas in a better condition than when they arrived.