Who owns airfields...?

I'm interested in borrowing/renting an airfield for a few weekends to a run a skid pan for some members of the local community

...who actually owns airfields and how do you get in contact with them? Is it the local council or are they privately owned? I'm sure many of the WWII airfields are barely being used

Any information would be greatly appreciated, thanks

A location would help a little in bringing answers to your questions.
There is already a skid pan at North Weald airfield in Essex, so where do you wish yours to be?

I'm looking for something thats within an hour or so's drive from Birmingham...

I've been having a look through ukga, but there are just so many airfields listed...a lot of which no longer have a tarmac runway, or are just a grass field :confused:

Wellsbourne, Bruntingthorpe, Gaydon, Pershore and Long Marston are all within your preferred area. A case of trying to contact the owners unless someone on here has contact names available for these airfields.

I would have thought that wherever you finish up , the portion you use as a skid pan will need a pretty good tarmac/asphalt surface - got to be fairly slick to use as a skid pan .

That requirement alone will eliminate virtually all runway surfaces at non-operational fields and a hefty percentage at fields that are still in use.

you'd probably be better suited to a purpose built venue such as rockingham or the like rather than trying to sort out a skid pan yourselves on a bit of loose surfaced ww2 concrete, alternativley see if you can get a booking for the milbrook proving ground if theres enough of you?

a decent surface is a requirement...but its not a big issue if there's some cracks/minor potholes and the sort

its something that i'm looking to run as cheap as possible, instead of paying the rates that companies charge...and renting somewhere like rockingham is also too expensive...

hence looking for something that's probably not being used right now, that has some potential for alternate use...the problem is identifying the right airfield and then finding out who owns it :confused:

Shabz, have you considered Curbourough sprint course [former RAF Litchfield / Fradley] as a possible venue. It shouldn't be too expensive to hire the place.

maps.google.co.uk/maps?t=h&hl=en&ie=UTF8...005356,0.010128&z=17

www.curborough.co.uk

Alternatively, you can always try calling Big Thunder at Bruntingthorpe and see if you can strike some sort of deal

www.bigthunder.co.uk

some very useful suggestions which i'll follow up and try to find the contact info for...will let you know how i get along

if anyone has any further info for more local places that may be suitable...i'm all ears

Desborough airfield in Northamptonshire near Market Harborough might be worth a try. I know they have quite a few facilities there including a skid pan. Heres a couple of links-

www.thewebsitebusiness.co.uk/skidpannorthamptonshire/index.php

www.itsmymotorsport.co.uk/Desborough_rally_stage.htm

You might want to try Wymeswold airfield as well near Loughborough. Not sure if this will be any use mate but heres a link -

www.everymanracing.co.uk/terms.htm

Hope these help.
Steve