Senators Target FAA Flight Plans

By Monica Potts, The Stamford Advocate, Conn.

Feb. 16–STAMFORD — In an effort led by state senators from Stamford and Norwalk, the General Assembly’s Transportation Committee voted yesterday to draft a resolution that would make official the state’s opposition to the Federal Aviation Administration’s airspace redesign plan.

The FAA adopted the plan to reroute some flight paths from LaGuardia and Westchester County airports over lower Fairfield County in September.

In November, the state and a coalition of 14 municipalities sued the FAA over the plan.

“I thought it was important that the state of Connecticut take as many measures as possible and use the strongest of language to say how we all feel about the wrongheaded decision of the FAA,” said state Sen. Bob Duff, D-Norwalk, the committee vice chairman.

Duff said he will draft the resolution over the weekend. It would be nonbinding but would serve as an official censure, he said.

Opponents have said that the redesign will damage the region’s quality of life and that the FAA did not sufficiently explore alternatives, including the possibility of rerouting paths over less-populated areas.

The FAA has said the redesign will help ease congestion at New York City area airports, among the nation’s busiest and most delay-prone. A Government Accountability Office study in 2005 estimated that the FAA’s plans, including the airspace redesign, would reduce delays in the airports by 1 percent to 7 percent.

“As we have seen with the Broadwater plan in Long Island Sound, federal officials give very little thought not only to their own facts, but to public opinion,” state Sen. Andrew McDonald, D-Stamford, said in a statement.

Duff said he hopes the resolution, which will have to survive a vote by the committee before it reaches the General Assembly, would help support the plan’s local opponents.

“It gives them an additional leverage to say that this is not just a few people who care about this, but this is something that the entire state feels is important,” he said.

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