Most of the airfields I fly from are surrounded by extremely noise-phobic locals.
I think this is the case for 99 percent of all airfields worldwide. But outside the UK, noise abatement procedures are described on the approach plates, making those PPR calls unnecessary.
It may be useful to understand why so many UK airfields are PPR.
Probably 99% of GA sites are privately owned. The owner is thus entitled to require that all inbound pilots wear pink underpants...
Also many (most?) "strips" do not have permanent planning permission to operate. They work under a "28 day rule" which, in brief, allows you to be active on 28 days per year without permission being needed. Obviously this is no good for much flying so they are active more than 28 days, they keep records of movements, and after 10 years they can use that log to get a permanent permission to continue at the actual level of activity. But for the 10 years they need to keep a very low profile. Unfortunately there are publications that list the coordinates of many strips and this results in uninvited visitors who either do practice forced landings / go arounds or they just land. For this reason it is very hard to get based at such a strip; you practically need your grandfather to have fought with the owner's grandfather in the Battle of the Somme. They also strongly prefer "traditional" types; a TB20 owner is likely to get the middle finger salute (as I well know from when I was looking for a base). Anyway, while it is a very friendly scene, you cannot normally fly there without a prior phone call.
Other PPR reasons can be
etc...
By a ATC handover in german controlled airspace you must report your altitude/FL when not you get asked "pls confirm FL100". So far all over europa the controller is fine with that. But I didn´t say my cleared WP (only departures or HDG´s), that is the job of the 2nd controller at the screen ;-)
"Radar D-EOWR FL100 guten Tag" awnser "D-EOWR identified"
The verry best in GB is the perfekt english at the radio ;-)
Nobody doubts that unlicensed airstrips should be PPR. Not being part of the AIP, they are also not covered by the NOTAM system, so there is no way around calling the airfield operator in order to see if there is anything particular to be aware of.
I think what people from abroad have a gripe with is that even most medium and big size airports require PPR. Now that is what I call a work creation scheme.
Why does a place like Cranfield require PPR? Or Carlisle? Newcastle? Norwich? Oxford? Leicester? The list goes on forever. Please don't say "because these places have a couple of particularities that pilots need to be briefed on". As mentioned before, put it in the AIP and that's it.
The thing about "licensed airfields being only for use by the licensee or persons specifically authorized by him" doesn't count, because indeed there a few handfuls of airports that don't exercise this PPR thing (Coventry, Exeter, Gloucester, Southend, Blackpool, Biggin come to mind). Heck, even Shoreham just dropped it!
Why does a place like Cranfield require PPR? Or Carlisle? Newcastle? Norwich? Leicester? The list goes on forever. Please don't say "because these places have a couple of particularities that pilots need to be briefed on". As mentioned before, put it in the AIP and that's it.
Stupid reasons, but aviation everywhere has its share of stupid reasons that don't make sense.
We read about them here on EuroGA all the time.
Norwich "security" once confiscated my toothpaste, after I landed. The two jobsworths loved it and had a great laugh.
But I can give you similar idiocy examples from elsewhere e.g. Friedrichshafen. Other bollocks at La Rochelle.
How about Italy 
There is nowhere I've been where I didn't get some total bollocks from some jobsworth. Well, so far, not in Croatia or Slovenia, and in Greece only at Corfu.
It's an endless list. Pilots have to live with it.
But this isn't specifically British.
I was asking about specific stuff that is specifically UK and which visiting pilots find specifically difficult.
One example I could think of is the difficulty of filing flight plans at small airfields - where it may be assumed everybody is a Brit with an AFPEX account. I can see a lot of visitors are smart enough to know about internet filing, and probably everybody who has worked out how to read EuroGA will know about how to use the internet effectively, so this is a lousy place to ask that question, but a more traditional pilot could have some fun...
Licensed v. Unlicensed is almost meaningless nowadays. You need to be licensed to accept AOC flights, and to get CAA protection from somebody erecting 100ft trees at the end of the runway (on his land) but not to issue Notams.
By a ATC handover in german controlled airspace you must report your altitude/FL when not you get asked "pls confirm FL100".
Sure, but most airline traffic doesn't do the full report, otherwise I would have noticed it by now. Most of the time, after a "Zurich Radar, N113XX" call, you get something like "N113XX, radar contact" and that's it. Absolutely the norm in France.
I tend to make the full call when there is potential ambiguity e.g. when the previous controller has cleared me to climb to FL150 (especially if due wx, not a filed level) and I am still in the climb when I get transferred. Same with a transfer just after doing a 30 left "to avoid"; then I will report the current heading "to avoid".
Sure, but most airline traffic doesn't do the full report, otherwise I would have noticed it by now. Most of the time, after a "Zurich Radar, N113XX" call, you get something like "N113XX, radar contact" and that's it.
They certainly do do it almost all the time. As do I. No idea about the sectors that don't expect it.
Incidentally, some of the UK idiosyncrasies made it to the overseas colonies as well - both Singapore & Malaysia practice overhead joins in VFR; I had one yesterday. Really not one of my favourite maneuvers w/3 training aircraft in the pattern below me. (TAS was worth its weight in gold)
Give me the 45 degree from downwind join any day.
Amen to that.
The "standard overhead join" (not to be mistaken with the informal overhead joins in the rest of the world) is also a wonderfully miraculous thing. Performing this maneuver one has about twice the probability of colliding with other traffic in the pattern as with a simple 45 degree downwind join
Twaddle!
If performed correctly, it gives you good lookout, the chance to observe what is going on in the circuit and on the ground, whilst others watching know exactly what you are doing! That's not to say they are all performed correctly, some pilots do a cross country that totally misses the point as well as the ATZ!
Arriving in Britain with around 1000 hrs time from the USA, I liked the idea of the overhead join - if you're at an airfield with no radio operator it gives you the chance to look at the windsock and the airfield environment and check you're doing it right.
I didn't find anything particularly confusing about the UK, the information was easy to find on the various services, but many things strike me as irritating and bizarre:
Needlessly complex airspace layout (especially in the south) with consequently extremely cluttered charts. No wonder there are so many airspace busts, it can be hard to see that odd shaped polygon on a very cluttered 1:500,000 chart.
Class A near to and touching the ground.
Class A airways.
PPR at so many airfields where it's just not really necessary. Now I can understand it perfectly at grass airfields. In our soggy nation at the very least you're going to want to ask someone at the airfield which bits of the ground are waterlogged at the moment. However, why is PPR needed at Carlisle? Can't the all operate like Gloucester which seems to cope admirably without the need for PPR?
Jobsworths. Upthread it's been said that every country has its jobsworths, but in the GA scene I never met a single one in the United States in over 1000 hours of mostly VFR flying.
GAR requirement for Isle of Man/Channel Islands/NI/Eire. Yet they don't require the same of boat owners who can smuggle terrorists far easier, far more covertly and far more of them than the tiny capacity of a typical GA single.
On high vis, I also discovered that in some cases the high-vis requirement is being imposed on airports by the Police, not the airport. So many people in high vis now, it's not going to be long before you are more visible by not wearing it.
Twaddle!
I am a firm believer in Darwinism. If the "SOJ" would have any significant advantage over the level downwind/45-degree join, than it would have established itself worldwide by now (which means in 110 years of powered aviation). After all, we take the aeroplane to fly the shortest distance from A to B, not for flying circles around B.
