El Toro Noise

* In his comment for an article in The Times Orange County edition on Feb. 13 (“Home Value Report Cited by El Toro Airport Foes”), it seems to me that airport proponent Bruce Nestande is comparing apples (John Wayne Airport) with lemons (proposed El Toro airport) instead of comparing like with like as he suggests.

Commercial jets are quieter than military jets, but when you compare 30 flights a day with 30 flights an hour day and night, the total annoyance level is not less. Nestande also proudly tells us that there is a 16,000-acre noise buffer zone around the proposed airport. What he doesn’t say is that under the actual flight paths, only a small fraction of that exists to protect the impacted communities; the vast amount of that land is in areas where no planes will ever fly.

The same article quotes UC Irvine professor Louis Masotti claiming that property values have not been negatively affected in Newport Beach. Could this be due to restrictions placed on flights at John Wayne Airport, the ban on night flying and the size limitation of the planes?

Of course he must be aware that the FAA repeatedly has stated that in the future, such restrictions probably would not be allowed. At the proposed El Toro airport, we would get the largest planes flying and even larger ones not built yet, flying all night.

HERBERT FRANKLIN

Laguna Niguel