Board Chops Weekend Helicopter Ban

A weekend ban on helicopters at the East Hampton Airport will not be among the restrictions designed to reduce aircraft noise over East Hampton and the East End.

The measure, which would have barred helicopter takeoffs and landings from Thursday noon through Monday noon from May through September, was the most far-reaching of four laws developed after extensive study of the noise problem and related legal issues. It was dropped because of concern that barring helicopters from the Wainscott airport would only reroute them to the privately owned Montauk Airport, or to landing strips in Southampton and Westhampton, diverting noise complaints, along with the aircraft, elsewhere.

Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, the East Hampton Town Board’s airport liaison and sponsor of the proposed laws, said this week that after hearing from residents and officials of neighboring towns, she became “concerned about a real risk of unintended consequences.”

“We don’t want to move the problem from the westernmost part of the town to the easternmost,” she said, or “just shift the pain.”

The three remaining proposals will be put to a town board vote next week. Those regulations, expected to be adopted and in place before the start of the summer season, would establish an airport curfew from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m., with an extended curfew from 8 p.m. to 9 a.m. for “noisy” aircraft, which would be limited to one trip to the airport (landing and takeoff) per week during the season.

At a town board meeting on Tuesday, Ms. Burke-Gonzalez stated that the three laws on the table were “not the end of a process, but the beginning of a long-term commitment to achieving and maintaining the right balance between airport operations and our community’s quality of life.”

According to the town’s noise consultant, she said, the three regulations will affect 75 percent of helicopter flights that occur on weekends and holidays, along with 73 percent of the complaints about them. Overall, she said, it would affect 23 percent of all aircraft operations annually while addressing 60 percent of the noise complaints.

“That is, in my mind, meaningful relief,” she said. “It is relief that our residents will receive without shifting the burden to other communities.”

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez cited the concerns of Riverhead and Southampton public officials who spoke at a March 12 hearing on the package of four laws. Southampton Village Mayor Mark Epley had protested that diversion of even 10 percent of the helicopters seeking to land at East Hampton to the village-owned Southampton Heliport, which is unmanned and lacks emergency services, would double the operations at that facility and create a “serious safety issue.”

Southampton Town Supervisor Anna Throne-Holst, along with Councilwomen Christine Scalera and Bridget Fleming and Riverhead Town Councilwoman Jodi Giglio, said diversion of helicopter flights to Gabreski Airport in Westhampton would have a negative impact on its surrounding communities.

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez predicted on Monday that the one-trip-per-week limit imposed on noisy aircraft would result in quieter weekdays in East Hampton. Companies that offer air service to and from the town would probably make their only weekly trip on or near the weekend, she suggested, when more visitors are seeking transport.

She also suggested that companies might start using quieter helicopters to fly here. There are several models with noise ratings below the town’s proposed noise threshold.

But Charles Ehren, the co-chairman of the Quiet Skies Coalition, which is based in East Hampton, fears, he said Tuesday, that air transportation companies will get around the once-a-week restriction by using a wider variety of aircraft for East Hampton runs. He applauded the town board’s efforts to address airport noise “with one exception,” dropping the ban.

The three laws Ms. Burke-Gonzalez will offer at the board’s meeting next Thursday will be “part of a much larger package of actions,” she said, which are outlined in an eight-point airport plan.

Besides the adoption of the three local laws, the plan includes working closely with East Hampton’s Congressman Lee Zeldin, who is pressing the Federal Aviation Administration to require that helicopters maintain a minimum altitude on flights from New York City to the East End. The town will also call on the F.A.A. to establish a regional task force charged with finding long-term solutions to the problem of aircraft noise, by addressing flight tracks, altitudes, and flight procedures. In the short term, the town will work with the Eastern Region Helicopter Council and other industry groups to develop voluntary noise-mitigation procedures.

The town will also upgrade its flight-tracking and noise-monitoring systems, Ms. Burke-Gonzalez said, “to make sure we have the best data available on operations at the airport.” After this summer, professionals will analyze the effect of the new laws. The results will be presented at a public meeting, the councilwoman promised, where any changes in the restrictions will be discussed.

The plan also calls for the appointment of an airport management advisory committee, which will replace several advisory committees set up by Ms. Burke-Gonzalez toward the start of deliberations over the airport laws. The new committee will include representatives “from the range of interests who have been involved in the airport debate,” she said.

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez also addressed comments that, she said, “have appeared in local papers by the aviation interests’ paid publicists.” Contrary to their assertions, she said, a reduction in air traffic will not make it necessary to use taxpayers’ money to subsidize the airport. “The assets at the airport and revenue generated by the airport will continue to adequately fund airport operations, capital improvements, and potential litigation,” she said.

The town board is to consider an increase in landing fees before the coming summer, she said, as well as an increase in rents on airport property, as existing leases expire. Financial audits for 2014 are expected to confirm a $1.8 million surplus in the airport fund, she said, assuring the board that the airport will be maintained “as safe and efficient.”

Ms. Burke-Gonzalez said that dropping the weekend helicopter ban was based solely on concerns about the impact of diverting that traffic. Opponents’ predictions of dire economic consequences should flights be restricted were not persuasive, she said, in light of financial analyses.

In response to the councilwoman’s statement, the Friends of the East Hampton Airport, an organization made up of several New Jersey-based businesses, issued a statement of its own, reiterating its concerns.

“Unfortunately, these ‘changes’ don’t change anything at all,” said Loren Riegelhaupt, a spokesman for the group. “The proposal would close off the airport to the vast majority of traffic, resulting in a dramatic loss in revenue for the airport and economic activity for our community, and will do nothing to mitigate the obvious impact on neighboring communities across the East End. We remain committed to finding real solutions to addressing aircraft noise and welcome the town’s statement that they want to continue to partner with the aviation community.”

Adopting the three laws “is the most reasonable first step,” Ms. Burke-Gonzalez said in her statement, adding, during a phone interview, that “with any balanced approach, you’re not going to make anybody happy.”