Naval Air Station Looks for a Bit of Elbowroom

By Chris Vaughn, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Texas

Jul. 10–FORT WORTH — The Defense Department, working with conservation agencies and communities, is adding safety and noise buffers at dozens of bases nationwide, including Fort Hood in Central Texas, Naval Air Station Corpus Christi and Fort Sill, Okla., by paying landowners for restrictive easements.

But the idea has never been floated in Fort Worth, where community and Navy leaders have grown more concerned in recent years about residential and commercial crowding around Naval Air Station Fort Worth.

Until now, that is.

“This is Fort Worth catching up to others,” said Rachel Wiggins, senior transportation planner with the North Central Texas Council of Governments.

A task force, led by Fort Worth Councilman Chuck Silcox and Lake Worth City Manager Joey Highfill, is studying ways to better coordinate new development so that the military’s flight operations are not affected, as has happened at some air installations.

The panel includes representatives of Fort Worth, Benbrook, Lake Worth, River Oaks, Westworth Village and White Settlement.

The group’s recommendations to area city councils are not expected until autumn. But among the possibilities are changing zoning to prohibit single-family housing in some areas, tightening building codes to require better soundproofing in windows and insulation, and modifying real estate disclosure regulations.

Recently, the group has been trying to gauge interest among landowners or city governments in the purchase of land in high-risk crash or noise zones, particularly north of the runway where houses are closest to flight operations.

Officials caution that the program will not involve the often-criticized use of eminent domain, under which the government can appropriate private land. Landowners must be voluntary sellers.

The Defense Department would have to decide if the land is of value to the military. And there would have to be enough partners to finance the deal.

Outright property acquisition is an option if, for example, a city wanted to create a park or nature preserve on vacant land. Or a landowner could receive compensation for easements that would limit the property’s development or use.

“It is my sense that the Defense Department is trying not to get into the business of buying land that they would have to maintain,” said Navy Lt. Keith Morris, the air-traffic-control officer on base. “I think what they would rather do is to partner with other organizations to acquire land or get easements over the land so that we can meet our mission.”

Authorities at Fort Sill, outside Lawton, Okla., have increased buffers around the artillery installation by paying $1.86 million for 650 acres of ranchland and farmland to remain that way. The funding came from the state of Oklahoma, the Defense Department and the U.S. Agriculture Department.

Around Naval Air Station Fort Worth, it is likely to be a good deal more complicated.

The base is surrounded by eight cities, thousands of homeowners and hundreds of businesses.

Even so, officials say, there are close to 3,000 acres of vacant land within the base’s “noise contour” that register at least 65 decibels a day, and hundreds of acres of vacant land within the base’s “accident potential zones.”

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Chris Vaughn, 817-390-7547 cvaughn@star-telegram.com

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