The Airport Noise-Abatement Issue

George A. Rebella’s letter response (May 14) to William Monroe’s letter regarding airport noise is filled with the same political and bureaucratic nonsense that constantly surrounds this whole subject. For anyone to take the position that the number, altitude and noise level of flights passing directly over our home on Balboa Island is somehow acceptable indicates a total lack of knowledge of the true situation.

I would like to invite Rebella and any officials he would like to bring along to have coffee with us on our patio on Ruby Avenue any morning at 7:03. Then, and apparently only then, will he perhaps realize the intolerable conditions for the residents of our island created by the routing of 100% of John Wayne’s commercial flights directly over our heads. A spreading of the misery by the adoption of perhaps three or four additional takeoff vectors would at least allow for a fair exposure by other neighborhoods of Newport Beach to the burden now borne by those of us directly under the present flight path.

The official position that BAe-146 aircraft do not make enough noise to be objectionable and therefore somehow do not count in the daily tally indicates either plugged ears or fuzzy thinking on somebody’s part. With the upcoming increased capacity of the passenger terminal and the already authorized further increase in the number of flights, it is absolutely ridiculous to exclude any multi-engine commercial jet aircraft from noise control restrictions. Admittedly, the 737s and certainly the MD-80s are louder than the BAe-146s. However, to term the latter quiet and unobjectionable is absurd.

It is time for our airport and elected officials to stop talking in riddles and start doing something. I am hoping for a response to my invitation.

JOHN P. CUNNINGHAM

Balboa Island