Fuming Fliers : Pilots Oppose Plan for Shopping Area Near Runway

Ventura County pilots are fuming over a developer’s proposal to build a shopping center across from a runway at Oxnard Airport, arguing that the plan could increase the potential for catastrophe in any future air crash.

“That’s one of the worst spots to put something in,” said pilot David Madison. “It’s right under the final approach path, and that end of the runway is sometimes used for takeoffs. If a problem were to develop, you would probably end up in that area.”

Citing potential safety hazards, the Oxnard Planning Commission voted last month to block the proposed shopping center, which would be located northeast of Ventura Road and Fifth Street and would contain an Albertson’s supermarket.

But the Oxnard City Council today will consider reversing the Planning Commission’s decision. Staff members in a city report recommend approving the development.

Pilots say the Oxnard City Council--which reversed a similar Planning Commission decision in 1992, allowing a McDonald’s restaurant to be built near the same runway--has not responded to concerns about the possibility for disaster.

David Ousley, president of the Ventura County Aviation Assn., said the potential for a tragedy would be great if the development is approved.

He cited as an example of what could happen a Sacramento crash during the early 1970s where a plane smashed into an ice cream parlor next to the runway and killed 23 people.

“The big crash in Sacramento, over at Farrell’s Ice Cream, that’s what we’re all thinking about,” said Ousley, who works for a company at Oxnard Airport. “That’s what has a lot of us concerned, when the runway is used for takeoff.” In addition to countless recreational aircraft, 28 commercial flights--all small, 18-passenger planes--pass through Oxnard Airport every day, said John Dodd, operations supervisor for the Ventura County Department of Airports.

Dodd said no crashes have occurred at the site since about 10 years ago when a single-engine plane went down in the Abex industrial lot adjacent to the airport, killing the pilot.

Oxnard staff members are recommending that the City Council approve the development because it is outside the airport’s inner safety zone and runway protection zone, the legal boundaries for development required by the Oxnard Airport and Ventura County Airport Land Use Plan.

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The Federal Aviation Administration reviewed the project and found that it met all adopted land-use standards, according to a city report. But like the McDonald’s, a portion of the shopping center’s parking lot would be located within the safety zone, and no environmental impact report has been done on the possible effects of the development, Ousley said.

“The runway clear zone should be kept open from parking lots or development,” Ousley said. “Without an EIR (environmental impact report), we don’t see how it can be approved. We think the McDonald’s was a big mistake.”

Ousley said the pilots are considering legal action against Oxnard.

“As far as I’m concerned, if anyone dies there, it’s on their hands,” Ousley said. “They are responsible. The developers and the Oxnard City Council are walking hand in hand and encroaching on the airport.”

Madison said he and other pilots realize that the area surrounding the airport will eventually be developed, but they want the projects to be out of the way of their flight paths.

“We want something that is compatible with the airport, not something that is going to pose a danger to the pilots and the community,” Madison said. “We’re worried that the airport will end up getting surrounded by safety hazards and will end up getting shut down.”

Oxnard Mayor Manuel Lopez said that since his tenure as a planning commissioner in the 1970s he has seen four projects proposed for the site in question, including a large health club, and this is the most reasonable.

“This is by far the least intrusive of any proposed development we have had there,” Lopez said. “Unless there is something there I’m not aware of, I would be inclined to support it.”

Besides, Lopez added, plane crashes will always occur, and all you can do is abide by the federal, state and local safety rules.

“They can crash just as easily into City Hall or elsewhere,” Lopez said. Planes crash everywhere, you just have to obey the existing safety laws and hope for the best.”