Supervisors Push Plan for Airport Tower

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors is urging the Federal Aviation Administration to build an air-traffic control tower at Whiteman Airport in Pacoima, despite an FAA study that determined the small airport is not busy enough to warrant a tower.

Supervisor Mike Antonovich, in calling for the tower, cited Whiteman’s proximity to busy Burbank and Van Nuys airports. The tower would mean better regulation of small planes in the Whiteman traffic pattern, which is in airspace 1,000 feet below one of the main jet approaches to Burbank Airport, he said.

The entire board of supervisors endorsed the tower proposal in a report to U.S. Sen. Pete Wilson (R-Calif). And Antonovich said Tuesday that, as the newly seated chairman of the board, he will make the project a “top priority.”

“This is very important because of the fact that the second and third busiest airports in the county are so close to Whiteman,” Antonovich said, referring to Burbank and Van Nuys Airports. “County fire department helicopters are at Whiteman. They need a tower in poor visibility.”

The FAA has said that Whiteman Airport, where pilots visually determine when to take off and land without the aid of a traffic controller, falls 30% short of the requirements for establishing an air traffic tower.

An airport with about 200,000 “operations”--take-offs and landings--a year is considered by the FAA to be in need of a tower. Whiteman has averaged 150,000 operations in each of the past two years.

Elly Brekke, spokeswoman for the FAA’s Western Pacific Regional office, said Tuesday that Whiteman does not qualify for a tower under federal rules, and “it would take an act of Congress to deviate from the established guidelines.”

Nevertheless, Antonovich pushed for the Whiteman tower, and called for FAA funding, in comments Friday during a hearing hosted by Wilson on ways to improve aviation safety in Los Angeles County.

Antonovich said he met in October with FAA Administrator Donald D. Engen on the Whiteman tower issue and other aviation safety concerns. “The problem is going to be getting it through the bureaucracy in Congress,” he said.

An aide to Wilson said that the senator is studying the issue but is not ready to draft legislation to make an exception for a Whiteman Airport tower.

Wilson is expected to take a seat on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, which oversees the FAA, when Congress convenes in January.

Pilots Noncommittal

The Whiteman Pilots Assn. has not taken a stand on the air tower issue, a group leader said.

“I think there is a general consensus that a tower would add to the safety and cut down on interference with Burbank traffic,” said Louis Stearns of Northridge. “But there are some who don’t fly as much and don’t have radios who are not as anxious to have a tower.”

Pilots generally have not wanted to take a public stand on the tower because they fear that increased FAA regulation will destroy their airport’s “cordial, laid-back” operations, Stearns said.

“We know that as the airport population increases, so does the potential for problems,” Stearns said. “But we also want to preserve the airport’s current atmosphere. If we could have the tower and still preserve the other stuff, that would be our aim.”

About 700 planes are tied down at Whiteman, 50% more than three years ago, said Asst. Airport Manager Jon Bergstrom. The jump is attributed to the 1984 closure of San Fernando Airport.

The airport, one of five owned by Los Angeles County, is used mostly by single-engine planes owned by private pilots.