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When we set out on our historic campaign to stop Heathrow expansion nearly a decade ago a victory party would have seemed like a dream. But our triumph was no fluke. It wasn't a question of luck. It was the result of a clear strategy, a radical approach, daring tactics and an utter refusal to believe that we wouldn't win. This article seeks to show how we achieved our goal. Although the actual campaign against the third runway didn't begin until 2002, we were aware in 1997 that a new runway might be on the cards. The new government was showing little sympathy towards people living around airports and under flight paths, and its first Aviation Minister, Glenda Jackson, was regarded as a close friend of the aviation industry. We knew we had to start planning our strategy straightaway if we were to have a chance of defeating any plans for the expansion of Heathrow and the other airports: success is much more likely if campaigners can map out a long-term strategy. When planning for big projects like new runways or new roads, business and the civil service think many years ahead. We need to try to match that. In 1997, well before plans for the third runway were announced, campaigners from Heathrow, Stansted and Gatwick started meeting with a handful of national environmental organisations to discuss joint working, brought together by Transport 2000, the country's premier transport lobbying organisation. By 2000 these early discussions resulted in the formation of Airport Watch, a national umbrella body which aimed to bring together the campaign groups around the different airports and the national environmental organisations opposed to airport expansion. This loose coalition of groups has been supported by some of the biggest environmental organisations in the UK, including Friends of the Earth, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, the National Trust and Greenpeace, and it also contains a wide variety of local campaign groups around airports, from a range of different perspectives and constituencies. The group united around a call for a demand management approach to aviation, something we could all sign up to. A number of key factors were fundamental to the survival and the growing success of Airport Watch. Adapted from the source document.