By Julia Reeves Santa Monica
I am 100 percent behind Friends of Sunset Park in their fight to ban faster aircraft from landing and taking off from Santa Monica Airport (“No fly zone,” Oct. 9). By now, everyone knows that the airport was not designed to accommodate fast flying jets, and the safety of residents surrounding the airport is at risk.
It would seem to me that the FAA would be more concerned about the dangers to residents presented by jets. It is unfortunate that their concern is “that some aircraft would no longer be able to use the runway because it would be significantly shortened under City Hall’s plan to essentially take 300 feet on both sides out of operation” to insure the safety of residential homes situated close to the airport and runways.
Whose homes and lives are at risk by the ever-present danger presented by faster aircraft using the airport, where usage has increased from about 800 times a year during the 1980s to 9,000 in 2006? What will the count be for 2007?
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on October 11, 2007. Read the original PDF.