7 Airlines Ask Port for More Time in Meeting Noise-Reduction Rules
Chafing under a mandatory plan to cut jet engine noise at San Diego’s center city airport, seven airlines have asked the San Diego Unified Port District for temporary relief from new rules that require them to use quieter Stage III aircraft at Lindbergh Field.
Port Director Don Nay said that, by Tuesday, the deadline for exemption requests under the rules adopted last month, he had received applications for relief from United, Delta, Pan Am, America West, Continental, Southwest and Alaska airlines. Most of the airlines want several more months to comply with the rules, which went into effect Jan. 1.
In making their requests, three airlines--United, Delta and Pan Am--warned that the new regulations would force them to drastically curtail or suspend service altogether to Lindbergh.
‘Little Bit Shrill’
Pan Am, with six daily departures, wrote to the Port District on Jan. 10 that it may have to bow out of San Diego. United warned in a Jan. 3 letter that it would suspend 15 or 20 of its daily departures because it cannot find enough of the newer Stage III aircraft to satisfy the Port District, which owns and operates Lindbergh.
Nay said Tuesday that he doubts the airlines will follow through on their warnings, which he characterized as a “little bit shrill.”
“The market is going to be served,” said Nay, who must make the initial decision on the variance requests within 45 days.
“If they pull out, there will be another carrier with quieter aircraft that will step in the breach.”
A spokesman for Delta, which threatened to drop 10 of its flights from Lindbergh, said Tuesday that his company’s warnings about service cutbacks were meant only as a “worst-case scenario.” The company now believes it can meet the new requirements by June 1, he said.
The major airlines lodged strong protests last month when the Board of Port Commissioners adopted the regulations after nearly a year of closed-door negotiations between the Port District and groups affected by noise at Lindbergh Field, such as neighborhood groups and military installations.
9-Point Compromise
Often at odds over the jarring noise made by jets taking off from Lindbergh, the antagonists were able to fashion a nine-point compromise that, at its heart, requires the airlines to upgrade their older Stage II jet fleet with the new Stage III models, which are about 12 times quieter than their predecessors.
As of November, nearly 54% of the commercial jets using the airport were Stage III, according to Port District statistics.
But the airlines will be required to raise that ratio to 75% by 1993 and 100% by 1999 under the new plan, which also includes fines of $1,000 to $5,000 per flight that violates the schedule.
As a first step toward a quieter fleet, airlines were asked this month to begin using 10% more Stage III aircrafts in Lindbergh operations than are used in their total fleet mix. For example, if one airline’s domestic fleet is 25% Stage III, the Port District requires that 35% of its departures and take-offs from Lindbergh use the newer, quieter jets.
United Airlines, for one, claims the requirement puts it in a bind at Lindbergh, spokesman Bob Doughty said. Although its national fleet mix is 41% Stage III, United flies only 15% of its 20 departures and 24 arrivals out of Lindbergh as Stage III. Under the Port District’s rules, United was obligated as of Jan. 1 to fly 51% of its flights as Stage III out of Lindbergh.
In its request for relief, United told the Port District that it would be able to move in enough of the newer jets to make sure that 41% of its San Diego operations will be Stage III by July 1.
Looking for Commitment
“We’re increasing new airplanes into our fleet at three or four a month,” Doughty said. “Our system is national. It’s a very complex scheduling program. We have to move airplanes all over the country.”
Other airlines were asking for similar extensions--requests Nay said he may be inclined to grant. Pan Am, for example, has asked to be given until Oct. 1 to bring in Stage III aircraft.
“The thing we’re looking for is not so much an instantaneous change in the mix,” Nay said. “We’re interested in having them commit to us that there will be an improvement.”
