Noisier Skies Expected With the Closure of LAX Runway

Some El Segundo and Westchester residents living near Los Angeles International Airport are likely to notice more jet noise beginning this week as reconstruction begins on one of the airport’s four runways.

Runway 24 Left, which is crumbling, will be shut down for repairs for four months beginning Tuesday. Because of the closing, 371 flights daily will be rescheduled and 50 canceled. There are about 2,000 flights daily.

Runway 24 Left is one of the two runways nearest to the airport’s terminals and farthest from communities affected by jet noise. These two runways are used for the overwhelming majority of takeoffs, when aircraft are loudest. Airport figures show that about 50% of the takeoffs at LAX last year were on 24 Left. The airport’s four runways are parallel, running from east to west. The two central runways are 24 Left, which is north of the terminal area, and 25 Right, which is to the south.

When 24 Left is closed, more jets will take off--and land--on the one remaining runway closest to the terminals and the two outermost runways, or those closest to El Segundo on one side and Westchester on the other.

Noise-Reduction Procedures

Airport officials say they do not know how much more jet noise residents will experience because of the closing. Existing noise-abatement procedures, such as routing arriving aircraft over the ocean from midnight to 6 a.m., will remain in effect during 24 Left’s reconstruction, they say.

“It is difficult to tell” what the impact will be, said Donald Miller, LAX’s deputy executive director. “We are talking about something that is hard to quantify.”

But Miller predicted the impact “will be less extreme than a lot of people have expressed.” For one thing, he said, the reconstruction will take place during a typically slow period for the airport--after New Year’s and before the busy summer season.

Additionally, Miller pointed to the closure in late 1983 and early 1984 of the airport’s two southernmost runways for construction work. During that 18-month construction period, Miller said, one runway or the other was alternately closed. He said he does not recall any major noise problems occurring then.

“Admittedly, the number of (airport) operations are up somewhat” since that time, Miller said, “but it is not that significant of an increase.”

Airport figures show there were 667,200 takeoffs and landings at LAX during 1987 compared to 550,755 during 1984, or a 21% increase.

Wesley Joe, the environmental inspector who handles airport noise complaints for El Segundo, said residents have been asked to closely monitor aircraft operations over their homes and contact the city if they are affected.

“Obviously, we are going to experience an increase in operations,” Joe said, adding that the reconstruction’s impact on El Segundo residents is “unpredictable” until the work begins.

Grace Huth, who lives in Westchester and is a frequent critic of airport officials over noise issues, said she believes that the area’s residents could “suffer a lot of hardship” during the reconstruction. LAX officials should have made a better attempt to determine exactly what the impact will be on people living near the airport before it allowed the work to take place, she said.

“I don’t want to have to complain every day at 3 a.m. in the morning for them to do something,” Huth said.

Salvatore Grammatico, president of A Coalition of Concerned Communities, a group of about a dozen homeowner groups stretching from El Segundo to Venice, also was critical of airport officials. He accused them of being insensitive to homeowners’ concerns about the increases in noise and traffic from construction crews that could result from the runway closing.

“It seems like they are always looking for the interests of the airlines to try to keep them in operation 100%. . .,” Grammatico said.

LAX officials say they have no choice but to rebuild the 30-year-old runway. Cracks have begun to appear on its surface, and some concrete chunks have been loosened over the years by giant aircraft.

By closing the runway altogether instead of doing the work piecemeal, airport officials maintain the work will be completed faster and, ultimately, with fewer disruptions to airlines and homeowners.

“This is a necessary project,” LAX spokeswoman Virginia Black said. “We are accomplishing it in the fastest time possible to make sure the impact doesn’t last any longer than possible.”

“Four months goes by before we know it, and we have a brand new runway,” she added.

Residents with aircraft noise complaints can call LAX by dialing 64-NOISE.