Advice on where to fly in Suffolk

Where to fly your drone in the UK
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I’m struggling to find places I can legally fly around Suffolk. Anyone have any suggestions?

It often seems pretty difficult to figure out who the landowner is for private land. And for council parks and open areas:

  • West Suffolk Council explicitly don’t allow flying over theirs (Drones).
  • Ipswich Borough Council have said no also (although they seem to claim that Orwell Country Park land extends halfway into the river)
  • East Suffolk Council have a similar policy (although not all of the beaches are council owned - East Suffolk Council Ownership - East Suffolk - WebGIS)

I’ve read a few posts on here, and I’m confused where the line between “get permission” and “use common sense” is. Help!

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Use common sense. Very hard in most instances to get permission! I too live in Suffolk under a BIG NFZ

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Welcome to the forum

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Thanks, Manty! Yeah, that was the impression I was getting. I feel like officials don’t really understand the rules or don’t want to get in trouble with their superiors, so default to “no” because it’s easier!

I know the CAA appear to have a more relaxed attitude to things - just as long as you’re not violating airspace or doing something dangerous.

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Hi Leeky, and welcome to the GADC.
We come down to the good old “Drone Code”, stick to it and fly where you can.
I do not look for places where i can’t fly, always look for potential places you would like to fly.
Early morning , late evening is always a prime time to get to fly those crowded “during the day” flights that you would like to fly.
If you took every place as a NFZ, you would never get air born !.

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Hi
I fly at East lane car park Bawdsey. Old WW2 fortification and normally not many people around. Not been told its off limits and can not find any by-laws. Just watch out for para gliders who take off from a field near there.

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Thanks for the advise, I may head over there this afternoon for a quick fly

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Welcoem to GADC.

It’s worth remembering that policies are not law and they cannot stop you taking off and landing from a public space unless there is either a bylaw or other statutory regulation on their books explicitly banning them from using their land.

Basically if it’s a council owned space yo are pretty much free to use it to your hearts content because very very few councils have any bylaws in place and those that do are so outdated its questionable whether they would hold up in court anyway.

Don’t ask permission unless you know 100% it’s private land. It’s that simple. Everyone will say no and rely on your ignorance of the laws regarding drone flying on and over publicly owned land.

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I live in Suffolk and have flown all over the Bury St Edmunds area without any issues. Never asked for (or needed) any permissions, and always used as much common sense as I can muster!

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The West Suffolk council page is incorrect about flying drones near people

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@DrGallaway it is indeed horrendously out of date, they even link to a CAA web site which no longer exists.

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I have had no issues flying in parks. Quite a lot of interest from folk asking about drone flying. A wrote (email) to Suffolk Council regarding flying in a park in Bury and they didn’t even bother to reply. No news is good news to me

Once had a “security” person ask me if I was flying a drone. I avoided sarcasm as that rarely goes down well. She got on her phone -presumably to her boss- then drove away.

Good sense prevailed.