Ruling Means Clear Skies for Burbank Airport

A state appeals court Thursday handed Burbank Airport a victory over the city of Los Angeles, unanimously upholding an environmental study clearing the airport’s plans for a new terminal.

The city of Los Angeles sued the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority in 1994, arguing that the airport failed to address aircraft noise and automobile traffic issues in the environmental-impact study of its plans to build a 19-gate terminal.

But the city’s case was rejected in 1994 by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Robert H. O’Brien, who held that the airport had complied with environmental laws.

O’Brien’s decision was upheld Thursday by a panel of three California Court of Appeal judges in a 34-page ruling written by Judge Patti S. Kitching.

“This means the terminal project is no longer under any cloud of challenge, under state or federal environmental laws,” said Burbank Airport spokesman Victor Gill. “We’re perfectly happy to go back to court on some of the smaller projects that Los Angeles is focusing on now.”

“This was one of the first in the recent round of cases filed against the airport,” said airport authority lawyer Richard Simon. “I am ecstatic. This is a fantastic victory.”

Los Angeles Deputy City Atty. Keith Pritsker countered that there was a silver lining for Los Angeles because the court allowed the city to go back to trial to challenge some provisions of the airport project.

“The city has won the right to go to trial on overall expansion plans and evaluate the environmental effects,” Pritsker said. “But we’re going to have to go back and get some direction from the City Council as to whether we will be appealing other parts of this decision to the state Supreme Court.”

Like the city of Burbank, Los Angeles has argued that a new terminal building at Burbank Airport would cause a hardship for communities under the airport’s flight path, acting on behalf of residents of Studio City, North Hollywood, Valley Village and Sherman Oaks.

The Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority has long maintained that airport traffic depends on passenger demand and airline decisions, not the size of the terminal.

In 1993, the city filed two suits challenging the environmental-impact report on behalf of local residents. The suits were later consolidated at the appeals court level.

In its initial case, the city challenged the adequacy of the authority’s environmental study, arguing that the airport failed to address the problems of aircraft noise and automobile traffic.

Los Angeles later charged the airport did not notify the public about other airport building projects, including expansion of aircraft taxiways, construction of a new fueling depot and other related proposals.

Los Angeles also challenged the federal environmental-impact study. But in March, a federal appeals court upheld the federal environmental review.