Airspace plan worries PDK, not necessarily residents

By April Hunt

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Homeowners around DeKalb-Peachtree Airport don’t know what to believe.

Officials at the northern DeKalb County airfield have warned that the area will suffer from increased noise and pollution under a federal proposal to change the airspace around Hartsfield-Jackson, 25 miles to the south.

But people living near PDK have been in battle over those same issues with the county-owned airport for 20 years. That they could suddenly be on the same side, faced against the country’s busiest airport, is hard to fathom.

“Mainly noise is the concern,” said Nathan Goodman, a software product manager who lives in the Briarcliff Woods neighborhood. “We want to give PDK the benefit of the doubt, but it’s hard to do.”

The Federal Aviation Administration is proposing to change what is known as Class B airspace, or the area handled by air traffic controllers, around Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport.

The change is needed to handle crowded skies, made more busy with the 2006 addition of a fifth runway at Hartsfield-Jackson, according to agency reports.

Adding more space means lowering the floor of airspace around parts of the metro region, meaning airliners could fly at lower altitudes. But that would cut into airspace of smaller planes, the kind that make PDK the state’s second-busiest airport with, on average, nearly 600 flights a day.

“By lowering the airspace, it enables us to better manage the skies for safety,” FAA spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen said. “Our plan is to make it more streamlined and uniform.”

Bergen added that FAA data show that 99 percent of PDK’s planes fly below the 5,000-foot shelf that the proposal would create over that airport. Planes from the airport now have 8,000 feet of airspace.

But PDK officials say that compressing the airspace means their planes will have to stay lower longer for takeoffs and landings.

“You are going to hear those airplanes. You’re going to see those airplanes,” PDK deputy director Mike Van Wie, a former air traffic controller, said during a recent community meeting. “They are going to light up the night sky.”

Nearby residents have made similar complaints against PDK for years, including claims that the airfield allowed overweight planes to use the airport and that PDK did not follow guidelines for air and water pollution.

A member of PDK Watch, an activist group, won an open records lawsuit in 2005 to gain access to records about airport operations. Relations have calmed somewhat since then, though tensions remain.

That is why some residents question Van Wie’s assertion in a meeting that the FAA changes lay the groundwork for even more disruption to their neighborhoods.

As technology improves, the flight paths will change to alleviate the overcrowded skies -- and put the big jets destined for Hartsfield-Jackson right over northern DeKalb, Van Wie said.

Bergen admitted that the current proposal could handle different flight paths, but he noted that no changes were imminent. The Class B proposed change alone is expected to take years.

Then there is the letter that a local resident sent to PDK Watch saying that even if those changes take place, they won’t create new noise in area neighborhoods.

George Obser, who identified himself as a commercial pilot who lives in the area, wrote that the the noise should be lower because jets flying into Hartsfield-Jackson would be on idle power.

That matches up with what Nikki Vandergrinten’s son, also a commercial pilot, told her.

Vandergrinten, a member of PDK Watch, added that any new noise from PDK would then extend 10 miles out, not in the immediate area of the airfield.

“I’m inclined to agree with the FAA,” Vandergrinten said. “At the least, I am very open to what they have to say.”

The FAA will hold a series of community meetings next week to gather public input. No FAA officials attended the community meetings in Chamblee, Dunwoody and with PDK Watch where the PDK information was presented.

The FAA also published slides and graphics of what the proposal calls for in the region. They are available at https://www.faasafety.gov/files/notices/2009/Nov/INFORMAL_AIRSPACE_MEETING.pdf.

PDK also has its own information up on the airport Web site, www.PDKairport.org, emphasizing its concern that the FAA proposal does not call for an environmental review.

Van Wie and airport director Lee Remmel recommended that residents write individual letters to the FAA expressing their concerns. Without an environmental study, the proposal is effectively approved, they said.

Despite the suspicion about PDK’s motives, complaints are likely. That’s because anything that affects the airport also affects the area economy.

With an average of 215,000 flights a year, PDK is responsible for about 7,300 jobs in the county and $130 million in personal income to county residents, according to a 1997 study, the most recent available.

“We are trying to tell a story about how good it is to do business here,” Chamblee City Councilman Tom Hogan said. “So aside from all the noise and environmental issues, I’m concerned about what this could mean for our economic development efforts.”

The FAA will take those sorts of concerns into consideration at its meetings. The sessions will be held at 3, 5 and 7 p.m. Monday at the Chamblee Civic Center and those same times March 4 at Peachtree City Falcon Field.

After that input, the agency will develop a final proposal, expected by year's end. If accepted, the change could happen in about two years.