Suggest Making Burbank Less Convenient for Travelers : Critics of Jet Noise Sound Off to Airport Panel

Like so many Daniels in a den of lions, the men who run Burbank Airport appeared before a meeting of east San Fernando Valley residents annoyed by jetliner noise who had been invited specifically to give them a hard time.

They did.

Among other things, members of the hostile crowd suggested that the airport management try to limit airline traffic by deliberately making life difficult for travelers so that they would choose Los Angeles International Airport instead.

Robert Garcin, the head of the airport authority, told the group the airport would not do that.

The suggestion was repeatedly voiced at a meeting Tuesday night by members of the audience, including Gerald Silver, president of Homeowners of Encino and a longtime critic of aircraft noise.

Silver suggested that if--as the airport executives have long maintained--the authority has little power under federal regulations to limit commercial use of the airport, then the airport authority could reduce or eliminate parking, restaurant and rental car facilities, shuttle buses and other airport amenities.

That could offset the convenient location of the airport and motivate would-be travelers to put up with the drive on the crowded San Diego Freeway to LAX instead, eliminating the passenger demand that attracts airlines to Burbank airport, Silver and the others argued.

Garcin responded that “if all we had at Burbank Airport was a giant tent, I think we’d still get three million passengers there” because of the convenience of flying from Burbank instead of LAX. Garcin accused Silver of trying to deny air travelers access to restrooms.

Suggestion ‘Just Silly’

Silver suggested that the airport’s planned new terminal be no bigger than the present building. The FAA has decreed the current facility must be torn down because it is too close to the runways.

After the meeting, Garcin told a member of the audience he thought the idea was “just silly.

“We are not going to try to duplicate a 50-year-old building,” he said. “We are going to give travelers the modern building and facilities they deserve.”

The airport authority is not trying to attract more travelers, he said, but it can see that there will be many more in the future and must prepare for them.

He was greeted with widespread skepticism and shouts of disbelief when he said that the airport authority and the three cities that formed it make no profit off the airport, that its budget is adjusted to break even on fees paid by airlines, passengers and tenants.

“I wish someone would just listen for a moment and not just express your preconceived prejudices,” Garcin said. “It doesn’t matter to the airport whether we have 200 more flights or 200 less.”

Garcin, president of the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority, appeared with T. E. Greer, the airport’s manager; R .M. Vacar, a noise control specialist and former air traffic controller who is the manager of airport affairs, and Victor Gill, the airport’s public relations spokesman.

The meeting, in a Sherman Oaks savings and loan, was organized by a coalition of homeowner associations representing Sherman Oaks, North Hollywood, Burbank, Studio City, Sun Valley and Van Nuys.

Flyers advertising the meeting said “The airport officials will explain why the drastic increase in flights has reduced the noise in our communities (that is what they say!).”

The handbills urged those attending to “ask Mr. Garcin . . . why there shouldn’t be a sharing of noise between the residents who live east of the airport and those of us who live to the south and west.” They suggested other, similar, questions.

“Share the noise” has been a slogan of the anti-noise groups, who complain that most jetliners taking off from Burbank Airport climb to cruising altitude over neighborhoods in the eastern San Fernando Valley, instead of in the opposite direction, over the three cities which own the airport.

Garcin and the others told the audience of about 140 that there is no question now of directing jetliner takeoffs to the east--over Burbank, Glendale and Pasadena--because the FAA has outlawed use of the eastbound runway for takeoffs, due to the proximity of the terminal building.

No Change in Takeoff

Even without the ban, which presumably will be dropped when the terminal is replaced, there would probably be little or no change in takeoff patterns, he said.

Before the ban on eastbound takeoffs, pilots chose the southbound runway for takeoffs 85% of the time anyway, Garcin said. The figure now stands at 90%.

Pilots--who have final authority over which runway to use--prefer to take off toward the south because the southbound runway is longer, runs downhill and usually faces into the wind. Because of other air traffic regulations, he said, they then must turn westward--over Studio City, North Hollywood and Sherman Oaks.

He said the authority had asked the FAA about the possibility of changing the rule to allow pilots to turn to the east after making a southbound takeoff “and the FAA said they wouldn’t even consider it” because of interference with the LAX traffic pattern.

Garcin told the crowd that they do not understand that the federal government controls most aspects of commercial aviation.

“If any nine of you--any nine--became Burbank Airport commissioners tomorrow and began passing the restrictions you want us to, you’d find yourself in federal court in a day or two, and the judge would throw out everything you did.”

A member of the audience accused him of coming before them with no answers to their complaints.

“You got an answer,” Garcin shot back. “There is no answer--that’s the answer.”