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Town Government & |
Committees: Logan Airport Community Advisory Committee
Note:The Logan Airport Community Committee is a community committee and not a Town committee. The train is coming but so are the planes. On Thursday, Thanksgiving Day, Massport plans to open a new runway called 14/32 which is designed to relieve air traffic congestion for smaller aircraft landing and taking off in a Northwesterly/Southeasterly direction. While many residents in Hingham are frequent business travelers and may welcome this attempt at reducing delays, there is a negative impact to Hingham as there will be more arrivals, more departures, more noise and more pollution from increased flights over our heads.
Passenger travel is back to pre-911 levels with the annual passenger growth forecasted by the FAA to be 73 percent by 2020 over today's levels. Airplanes are heavy users of fuel and jet engines produce significant volumes of nitrous oxides and carbine dioxide gases. It is estimated aircraft contribute 3.5% of global warming emissions world-wide which could rise to 15% by 2050 with increased passenger traffic. In addition, aircraft designers have been thinking of ways to make aircraft quieter but we will not see new technology for at least 25 years. Hingham, as with Hull and Cohasset, empowered the South Shore Jet Pollution Counsel and allocated funds to bring Massport to court to stop the building of 14/32 and protect the region. The high court rejected those suits in 2004 but ruled that the communities concerns with noise and pollution were valid and a further study was mandated. The Logan Airport Community Advisory Committee, Inc., more commonly known as CAC, was reformed with 29 communities from around the bay and is one of three sponsoring bodies for the Boston Overflight Noise Study (BONS). BONS is currently in the process of deciding alternatives for overflying all communities including Hingham. Phase 1, at a cost of $3 million and funded by Massport, is nearing completion with a series of votes in the coming weeks on the various alternatives being proposed. Almost all of the options are very good news for Hingham (and other South Shore communities) in terms of reduced overflights, less noise and less pollution. Should the decision be decisive, CAC will move to Phase 2, at a further cost of $5 million including an Environmental Impact Study and will focus on communities immediately surrounding Logan. The current study is seeking an equitable distribution of traffic over all communities and take advantage of flight over water wherever that option is available. For Hingham, on departures, the recommendation is to increase the altitude of aircraft crossing the shoreline after departure, in some cases from 11,000 to 14,000 feet. In addition, it is hoped that there will be a reduction in the number of flights flying over Hingham. The diverted flights will be equitably dispersed across the north shoreline and further down the south shore. On arrivals, the plan is to take advantage of more over-water routes in so far as possible while maintaining high altitude over land. These recommendations need to be approved by the airlines, air traffic controllers, FAA and of course Massport and hopefully implemented in late 2007. One area of continuing concern is night flights. You may been woken by a number of flights between 3am and 5am - typically package express and west coast arrivals who seem to feel they should be our early morning alarm clock. Further study is needed on these alternatives to eliminate this nuisance. My role is primarily to represent the best interests of Hingham residents and secondarily, the interests of all surrounding communities that are affected by overflights. As for Thursday, if you plan to be in Hingham, you probably will not notice any difference. Depending on the weather, you may notice the difference next Sunday, the year's second busiest travel day. If you are traveling, there may be more on-time flights but if you are in Hingham, you will notice much more aircraft over Hingham. Much more information is available at the following link http://www.bostonoverflightnoisestudy.com. Declan Boland was appointed in 2005 by the Hingham Selectmen as the town representative to CAC. If you have any comment, please contact Declan Boland at 781-741-5163 or email logancac@comcast.net.
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