Aviation and Airport Development Law : Aviation Lawyer & Attorney : Dr. Barbara E. Lichman : Airport Development, Environmental Law

For example, the Draft RTP anticipates that, after the “urban capacity constrained airports of Los Angeles International (“LAX”), Bob Hope, Long Beach and John Wayne Airports (sic)” all meet their “defined legally allowable or physical capacity constraints,” the remainder of the demand will be served at “suburban airports with ample capacity to serve future demand, including Ontario International, San Bernardino International, March Inland Port, Palmdale Regional, Southern California Logistics and Palm Springs airports.” Draft RTP, p. 58. While SCAG is correct about the availability of unused capacity at Ontario International (“ONT”) (which is at its lowest passenger level since 1987 despite ample facilities including a new, unused, terminal), SCAG is flat wrong in the assumption that: (1) the other named airports actually have usable capacity; and (2) the “remainder of the demand” will automatically be siphoned off to airports more remote than ONT (which is actually an urban airport in the midst of a highly developed and developing Inland Empire). For example, San Bernardino International Airport (“SBIA”), while sporting a new, completely empty, terminal with apparently ample groundside capacity, has serious airspace conflicts with ONT, as well as a $4,000 foot high mountain at the end of its principal runway.

The Draft RTP further opines that “congested airports have an interest in shifting traffic to less congested airports.” Draft RTP, p. 61. No they don’t. Airports earn revenue by, among other things, airline landing fees and concessions revenues like food and parking, which in turn depend on increasing numbers of passengers. The favored (although not always desirable) solution for congested airports is to simply create more capacity which is largely funded by Federal dollars appropriated by the Federal Aviation Administration (“FAA”), with little or no downside to the local operator.

Finally, the Draft RTP opines that “for airports like LAX which has a significant component of international traffic that generates more revenue than domestic flights, it may be more efficient to limit domestic flights that could be accommodated at other airports in the region, thereby freeing up capacity for more lucrative international flights.” Draft RTP, p. 61. As an organization charged with understanding transportation laws and regulations, SCAG should be aware that it is not up to the airport or the local jurisdiction that operates it to “limit domestic flights” or any flights for that matter. “The United States government has exclusive sovereignty of airspace of the United States,” 49 U.S.C. § 40103(a)(1), including the type of aircraft allowed to fly and where they may land. While other laws such as the Airport Noise and Capacity Act of 1990 (49 U.S.C. § 47521, et seq.) circumscribe the Federal government’s preemptive sovereignty to some extent, the local airport operator may only choose to construct, or not to construct, facilities to accommodate aircraft operations. Once such facilities exist, a local operator may not choose between operations based on their ultimate destinations.

In summary, while the Draft RTP’s general conceptual framework, analyzing transportation as a regional and cooperative issue among regional jurisdictions is supportable, the Draft RTP entirely omits from its aviation analysis reference to, or consideration of, the third party with the real power to make a difference in the allocation of regional air transportation resources – the FAA. Without such consideration, the Draft RTP’s aviation policies amount to nothing more than a wish list. The comment period on the Draft RTP extends until February 14, 2012.
 

The concept behind the Whispertrack system is simple: to “give airports an intuitive, web based tool to manage and update their noise abatement procedures” (Esaassoc.com/Airports, Summer 2011 Aviation Rising), as well as to distribute the various noise abatement procedures to flight crews and aircraft operators throughout the entire national air transportation system.

The Whispertrack system distributes noise abatement procedures in much the same way as Instrument Flight Rule procedures are distributed today: through flight planning/dispatch services developed by companies such as Honeywell, Universal, flightplan.com, AIRNAV and others. In essence, Whispertrack establishes a technical process extending across all categories of noise abatement procedure, and is intended to transmit this information universally, so that noise abatement procedures developed painstakingly by cooperative processes between aircraft and airport operators, air traffic controllers, and communities won’t be ignored by failure to integrate them into the normal flight planning system.

Whether Whispertrack will remedy the frequent divergence of aircraft from established noise abatement procedures is yet to be established by the year old process. What is certain is that Whispertrack is a step toward eliminating the “nobody told me” defense that so often accompanies divergence from established noise abatement procedures, observance of which is so heavily relied upon by noise impacted communities.