Technical details of PCPB September 25 meeting at San Diego Airport

This continues a report on the recent Peninsula Community Planning Board (PCPB) Airport Committee meeting at San Diego International Airport.

The San Diego County Regional Airport Authority (SDCRAA) provides a Flight Tracker for the public to use. It is a useful tool to view arrivals and departures on a 10 minute delay for security reasons. However, the largest viewing scale is five miles, not accurate enough to show streets and other ground coordinates.

CAPTION: (ABOVE) Flight tracking tool used by FAA and San Diego Airport Authority showing departure paths of aircraft from SAN (Original photo by Joel Siegfried)

A slide show follows this article with environmental images of Point Loma.

Related articles:

More questions raised at Airport meeting
Community Planning Board September meeting
Noise flap raises flak at San Diego Airport
Citizens worry about more future flights
Profile of Airport's Quieter Home Program
TSA finds hand grenades and other oddities

CAPTION: (Right) PCPB Airport Committee Chairman Suhail Khalil at Airport meeting of 25 September 2009 (Original photo by Joel Siegfried)

A much better tool displayed at the airport public meeting on a large wall monitor, is a flight tracker that the FAA and Airport Authority can access. Individual tracks can be selected, and magnified to show precise flight paths. Other information, such as flight number, airline, and aircraft type can also be displayed. Making such a tool available to the general public, with proper delay restrictions for security, could serve to demystify this issue, and make it more transparent to everyone.

CAPTION: (Left) Dan Frazee, Director of Airport Noise Mitigation at Airport meeting of 25 September 2009 (Original photo by Joel Siegfried)
 

It would also answer questions raised by the San Diego Airport Examiner concerning strict compliance with assigned headings, the amount of variations allowed, and the effects, if any, of winds aloft on an aircraft's heading compliance. According to FAA Manager Jeff Tittle, "Pilots must comply with assigned headings, the same as keeping to assigned altitude. There is no variance."

Concerning the airport's current departure curfew of 11:30 p.m. to 6:30 a.m., Dan Frazee, Director of Airport Noise Mitigation stated, "The curfew was established in 1975, and formalized in 1989. The Airport Authority intends to abide by its commitment to the community to maintain the present daily departure noise curfew as long as the airport remains in its current location."

CAPTION: (Right) Ryan Hall, the Airport Authority's Manager of Strategic Planning at Airport meeting of 25 September 2009 (Original photo by Joel Siegfried)

During the meeting, Ryan Hall, the Airport Authority's Manager of Strategic Planning, stated that current flight operations are presently around 200,000 per year. By 2015, they are projected to increase to 231,800 annually, a mark that was previously set in 2007 before the onset of the economic recession. The next eleven years are projected to be a slow recovery period. By 2018, airport operations should reach 245,900 for the year. In 2020 they are expected to expand to around 255,000 flights, close to the airport's operating capacity. Increased levels of ground delays can be expected.

To avoid any future airport meltdown, a document called "Destination Lindbergh" has been drafted. It is a coordinated long range plan involving the Airport authority, City of San Diego, and San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG), considers airport expansion, broadly including "economic and environmental sustainability, maximizing operational efficiency, integrating multiple modes of transportation that might include an intermodal transit center, and evaluating the entire airport as well as adjacent properties, to yield an ultimate build-out concept." Quotes are from the Destination Lindbergh Fact Sheet.

The Airport Authority Board accepted the Destination Lindbergh Draft Concept Plan for public distribution on March 23, 2009.

Peninsula Community Planning Board Airport Committee Chairman Suhail Khalil has scheduled a meeting on October 14 with Sate Senator Christine Kehoe to further discuss these developments. The next public meeting of the Peninsula Community Planning Board will take place on Thursday, October 15, 6:30 p.m. in the meeting room of the Point Loma Branch Library, at 3701 Voltaire Street. We will continue to report upon and update all developments.

CAPTION: (Above) Senator Kehoe meets Captain Chesley Sullenberger after he was honored Feb. 17 at the capitol. He safely landed U.S. Airlines Flight 1549 in the Hudson River in New York on Janunary 15, 2009. (Photo courtesy of Senator Christine Kehoe)

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