Office of Borough President James P. Molinaro
Staten Island, New York
B.P. Molinaro blasts redesigned airspace proposal as “FAA’s Frankenstein” that again ignores Staten Island
Says report panders to New Jersey while condemning Staten Island to nighttime ocean routing
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. – Borough President James P. Molinaro has fired off a letter to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to express his outrage that -- once again -- no mention is made of Staten Island in its Noise Mitigation Report – New York/New Jersey/Philadelphia Metropolitan Airspace Redesign Draft EIS that recommends the agency use nighttime ocean routing from Newark Airport, which -- to add insult to injury -- condemns Staten Islanders to “noise pollution hell.”
In the public report that explains what the FAA is gearing towards implementing for airspace redesign and the associated noise mitigation, the agency has determined that once a queuing line for Newark Runway 22’s departing flights nears 15 minutes, then all departing aircraft will begin to utilize multiple headings for takeoffs – the planes will not fly over Staten Island but use either straight out or angles that veer to the right upon takeoff. But between the hours of 10:30 p.m. and 6:00 a.m., the FAA will use the ocean-routing plan over Staten Island.
“I want to believe that the future will be quieter for my constituents,” Molinaro wrote the FAA. “I want to believe that once queuing delays start at Newark that multiple headings will be followed so that a substantial number of flights will move away from my ravaged borough’s airspace, especially during these horrendous summertime peak travel times, days, and months.
“But by continuously ignoring the existence of my constituents, as made clearly evident in the numerous examples from the FAA’s report, the FAA, in advocating both the 190-degree heading and the Over-the-Ocean proposal for seven-and-a-half hours each and every night, is choosing to pander to New Jersey, thereby condemning a new generation of Staten Islanders to sleep deprivation and to that circle of noise pollution hell, courtesy of the FAA and New Jersey.
“At an FAA public hearing over 12 years ago, this office called the constant reviving of the ocean-routing proposal ‘FAA’s Frankenstein.’ Eliminate this proposal, and I have no serious issues with the redesigned airspace. But if this ignorant and foolish nighttime procedure is approved and implemented, then the FAA will leave me no choice but to do what I must to stop its implementation,” Molinaro concluded.
May 15, 2007