Article contents from The Citizen included for posterity. This was the second meeting I was able to attend, the next round will be on December 4th. Essentially the fight is still on, and valid, but with the FAA’s timetables we’re unlikely to experience a final resolution until 2009 or 2010.
Neighborhood denied FAA funds to insulate airport-area homes
BY BECKY IANNOTTA
Citizen Staff
Linda Avenue residents want to know why all neighborhoods north and west of Key West International Airport except theirs have been retrofitted with new windows, doors and insulation to keep jet noise out of their homes.
They learned Tuesday they will have to wait for a new computer model of airplane noise to see if they, too, can receive the $70,000 per home upgrades.
The soundproofing is part of a $20 million project that has retrofitted 207 homes in Key West. The next phase, 72 homes on Flagler Avenue and Riviera Drive, is expected to begin late next year.
Federal Aviation and Administration grants have paid for 95 percent of the project, while the other 5 percent has come from the $4.50 per passenger fee charged for flights to Key West.
Fifteen Linda Avenue residents attended the county’s airport Ad Hoc Committee meeting Tuesday seeking assurance that their homes will receive the same upgrades as those of their neighbors.
“How about a look at the map? How about the fact that we’re surrounded by neighborhoods in the program?” asked Linda Avenue resident Ricky Jackson. “The word that comes to mind is asinine.”
Randy Sterling, another Linda Avenue resident, noted the proximity of his home to those that received soundproofing.
“Basically, we’re within 12 feet of it if my neighbor is in [the program] and we’re not,” he said. “It’s just frustrating to know that the height of the planes is lower going over our neighborhood than any other neighborhood.”
A model of airport noise created in 1999 put Linda Avenue just outside a noise contour that estimates the average noise level for surrounding neighborhoods at 65 decibels. In fall 2000, the FAA approved a seven-year plan for soundproofing 319 homes near the airport as part of the federal agency’s Noise Insulation Program. But in August 2005, an FAA spokeswoman told The Citizen that noise contours had shrunk due to the introduction of quieter regional jets at the airport.
Appeals to the FAA to reconsider and include 42 Linda Avenue and adjacent Flagler Avenue homes prompted the agency to direct the county to update its noise contours, and within the guidelines, explore whether the area is affected by aircraft noise.
“They’ve given us $100,000 to say go out there and see what you can do to make this happen,” said county airports Director Peter Horton.
It could take between six months to a year to complete the new computer model for airplane noise, according to Deborah Murphy Lagos, senior project manager for the county’s air transportation contractor, URS Corp.
Corporate jet pilot Sonny Knowles said flying over Linda Avenue while approaching the runway is the most efficient way to land at Key West International. Other factors, such as direction from the tower at Naval Air Station Key West also affect landing patterns, he said.
“You can’t dictate an aircraft to come in a certain way because there’s too many variables,” Knowles said.
Flight tracks shifted somewhat in 2003, after Old Town resident and then-committee member John Padget suggested planes approach the airport over Garrison Bight instead of Old Town. Airport officials passed the suggestion on to pilots, Horton said.
“I can tell you we haven’t received any complaints from Old Town since 2003, but now we get complaints from other streets like Fourth and Harris,” he said.
County Commissioner Dixie Spehar, chairwoman of the airport ad hoc committee, noted noise has long been an issue.
“We have tried all different directions,” she said. “There’s no good direction for anyone.”
Horton encouraged Linda Avenue residents to continue pressing for their homes to receive the soundproofing.
“I personally believe you will prevail,” he said. “I can’t guarantee it, but I believe you will prevail.”
riannotta@keysnews.com
The main neighborhood drama made MSNBC! I’ve included the article below for posterity. For reference, Dee is a sweet lady who lives 3 houses down from us, she’s further from the end of the runway. Unfortunately I was traveling and missed attending this meeting.
Relief sought for airplane noise in Key West
Keysnews.comHomeowners near airport cite inequities in soundproofing policy
BY ANN HENSON Citizen StaffDee Atwood can recite the schedule of Key West airport takeoffs and landings because she hears them every day. “There’s one at noon and then at 3 p.m.,” she said from her home on Linda Avenue last week. The noise will continue to roar inside and outside her home, because there is no federal money to help with soundproofing. Neighbors with homes on surrounding streets have taken advantage of a Federal Aviation Administration program to retrofit their homes for noise prevention. “They’ve done Riviera Drive and up by the high school and now are doing Staples Avenue. Why aren’t they doing my street?” asked Atwood, who has lived in her house for 53 years.
Atwood and some of her neighbors took their complaints to a meeting of the Ad-hoc Committee on Airport Noise on Tuesday at the Harvey Government Center. There, Deborah Murphy Largos, senior project manager for air transportation with URS Corporation and in charge of the noise prevention program, explained that in 2000 Linda Avenue was part of the program. “About a year or two ago, the FAA said some of the areas approved no longer met the criteria and they would not pay for them,” she said. Participating homes, determined by an average of day and night airplane noise decibels, receive the mitigation including new soundproof windows, increased insulation and central air conditioning for those with window units, paid for by the federal government and taxes collected on airplane tickets. “In 2005, legislation introduced by [U.S. Sen.] Trent Lott, [R-Miss.], took out the last contour, which in Key West amounted to 100 homes,” said Peter Horton, airport director. He agrees that the 30 homes on Linda Avenue should be included in the $50,000 to $65,000 worth of soundproofing.
So far, 200 homes near the airport have been retrofitted for sound, which cost about $15 million, Horton said. “It looks like we might get another 50 homes done that are outside the [noise] contour because we used new maps that dealt with sound from airports near water,” he said. But that would still leave Linda Avenue, which is near the Salt Ponds, out of the program, he said. Horton believes that when a parcel is near or touches a noise contour that receives the noise abatement work, the entire neighborhood should get it. He tried making that case to the FAA. “We said it’s for neighborhood equity and we wanted to do it all,” Horton said about Linda Avenue. A pastor’s house at the end of the street, but not accessible by Linda Avenue, has been retrofitted. But so far, the FAA, which takes its orders from Congress, is not budging on the rest of the 30 homes on the street. “Congress took them out and only Congress can put them back in,” Horton said.
Key West International Airport sees 250 takeoffs and landings per day. “At times, they do have planes flying over their homes, although they are not supposed to,” he said. While single, loud events make more of an impression, the FAA won’t noise-proof homes based on occasional loud noise. Key West Parks and Recreation Director Randy Sterling said the contour maps are incorrect. “The flight pattern they showed is wrong. They come right over Garrison Bight Marina, not east and west over the high school. They don’t do that,” he said. Largos said she is trying to obtain Navy radar records to prove that flights go right over the Linda Avenue homes. “We need to supply the FAA with as much information as we can,” she added. Contributing to the noise factor is the Delta regional jets that since 2000 take off and land at the airport, Largos said. Because the runway is so short, the pilots must put on the brakes and rev up the engine to maximum power at the end of the runway, then release the brakes and the jet takes off as if being catapulted out of a slingshot. When the air gets hotter and denser, it takes more time to rev up the engines, she said.
* The prior news-worthy drama for our street was of the unfortunate variety. Also from the Key West Citizen, courtesy of GoTo Key West as sadly the Citizen doesn’t keep their archives public:
Welcome to the block
Apparently nosy neighbors called police last week saying a black man with dreadlocks was trying to get into a home on Linda Avenue. After police arrived with their guns drawn, it was determined that a man and woman inside were new rental tenants.
This SO makes me cringe, and has sparked off theories as to which of the unfriendly neighbors was the racist a**hole.
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