Citizens sue FAA over air traffic
A group of Chelsea residents, including a city councilor, has sued the Federal Aviation Administration, arguing that noise levels over the city have become intolerable as a result of the increased use of runway 33L for departures at Logan Airport.
The residents contend the increased activity constitutes a change in runway use that warrants a public environmental review process that the FAA failed to initiate.
In a complaint filed April 30 in US District Court in Boston, attorney Peter L. Koff states that "the actions taken by the FAA to change runway usage at Logan Airport were done without it making an informed decision." Koff, who is also the Cambridge representative in his role as a member of the Logan Airport Community Advisory Committee (CAC), filed suit on behalf of four Chelsea residents, including City Councilor Roy A. Avellaneda, and three residents from East Boston, Charlestown, and Medford. They are seeking relief from the noise as well as attorney's fees.
"The plaintiffs are being exposed to excessive noise, air pollution, and other adverse impacts as a direct consequence of the actions of the FAA," Koff wrote. Flight patterns are set by the FAA.
FAA New England spokesman Jim Peters declined to comment on the pending litigation. Koff also declined a phone interview, citing the pending case.
The FAA New England regional administrator, Amy L. Corbett, in two letters dated Jan. 29, included in the suit and addressed to Koff, Somerville CAC representative Wig Zamore, and Cambridge City Manager Robert W. Healy, acknowledges the increased use of runway 33L but insists the FAA is in compliance with an environmental impact statement (EIS) finalized in 2002 stating that the new runway 14/32, which began operating in 2006, wouldn't change the frequency of runway use in the airport.
According to the Massachusetts Port Authority, which is not named in the suit, under high northwest winds, Logan can be restricted to using just runway 33L for arriving and departing aircraft. Under moderate northwest winds, 33L as well as the low-capacity runway 27 are used. Runway 14/32 was intended to make a third runway available for use during northwest wind conditions, according to the suit.
The problem, Koff argues, is that the FAA has shifted arrivals to runways 14/32 and 27, and most departures to 33L.
Using Massport data, Koff pointed out that in 2006, before runway 14/32 was available, runway 33L was used 6 percent of the time for departures. In 2007, after runway 14/32 had been in use for a year, departures from 33L increased to 18.8 percent of the time. In February, the latest numbers available, runway 33L had been used 22.5 percent of the time for departures.
"The substantial increase in use of runway 33L for jet aircraft departures has caused a significant increase in the number of airplane overflights and the level of airport noise in communities to the west and northwest of the airport, including many residential neighborhoods of East Boston and Charlestown, Chelsea, Somerville, Everett, Medford, and Cambridge," Koff wrote in the complaint, adding that noise complaints from those communities to Massport have increased since 2007.
In her letter, Corbett said that other than implementing the 10-knot wind restriction, there have been no changes to runway configuration selection from 2006 to 2007. She attributed the increased use of 33L in 2007 to two factors - a higher-than-average number of days with northwesterly winds and Massport taxiway construction projects in the vicinity of the departure end of runway 27, forcing aircraft to depart from 33L.
"We do not accept your conclusion that because runway 33L has seen increased use over and above the EIS's modeling that the FAA must reevaluate runway 32's effect on the airport," Corbett wrote. "We will continue to study this situation as part of the ongoing Boston Logan Airport Noise Study."
Zamore, Somerville's CAC representative, said it's easier for the FAA and the airport to run the airplanes over these communities, but that they should have initiated a public process beforehand, particularly because the number of take-offs from 33L has tripled.
"Runway 33L heads up over the most densely populated area in Eastern Mass., number one being Somerville and two being Chelsea, and the most intense immigrant population - first Chelsea and then Somerville - per square mile," Zamore said "And we've been working for years on their Logan noise study, but the things that have been addressed so far have been tiny. This is a much more massive change in impact with basically no study at all.
"The FAA is pretty big, Massport is pretty big, and I don't know who to specifically point the finger at, but I do know that this noise was not fairly managed through any process that involved the public," he said. "And it's not supposed to be that way."
US Representative Michael E. Capuano said he is not satisfied with the FAA's explanation.
"I don't expect we'll see any changes until we see a new president," Capuano said in a phone interview.
"Until we get a new head at the FAA, I don't have a lot of hope that we're going to win this, but we have to try."
If things don't improve within the next couple of years, Somerville resident Dwight Lancaster, a processing manager at a Boston consulting firm, said he is going to move out of the home he and his wife have shared for 14 years.
During northwesterly winds, the flight pattern is right over Lancaster's Fellsway West home. He said the planes are often low and turn around over the neighborhood, using powerful, loud jet engines that cause homes to shake and conversations to go unheard.
Often for days at a time, Lancaster said, the pattern repeats itself from 5 a.m. to 11 p.m.
"It seems unfair that Massport is wrecking my neighborhood," Lancaster said.
"I really fought this a lot last year, but you get numb after a point."
Katheleen Conti can be reached at kconti@globe.com.
