A Good Deal

So often it seems that the same old conflicts go on--and on and on--without ever reaching resolution. So it’s sweet satisfaction to see the city of Burbank and the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority strike an agreement after almost 30 years of squabbling over a new airport terminal.

The sweetest satisfaction, of course, will be seeing the much needed and long delayed new terminal itself, which should be open in about three years.

The agreement is being called a draft because it still must go before a town hall meeting later this month, a Burbank planning board meeting in early October and a Burbank City Council hearing in mid-October before the City Council can officially adopt it. To those malcontents--and there will be some--who will use the public hearings to grouse that this is already a done deal, our response is: So what? It’s a good deal, the very best that those who opposed expanding the terminal could hope for.

Burbank produced the draft agreement before the hearings because it had no choice. No responsible choice, that is. Because of a series of court rulings, the Airport Authority had to either make a huge payment on the land required for the new terminal or give up on the deal altogether if it looked like Burbank would continue to block construction. And anyone who advocated giving up on a new terminal altogether--or continuing to hold it hostage to a mandatory nighttime flight curfew--is blind to the safety problems caused by the old terminal’s close-to-the-runway location, not to mention its inconvenient access for the disabled.

Giving the Airport Authority a signal that it could go ahead with the purchase was about the only concession Burbank made. The city got everything it wanted: the same number of gates as the old terminal, a limit on the square footage and a limit on future expansion, which is dependent in turn on winning a curfew from the Federal Aviation Administration. The public hearings should be a public celebration.

The Airport Authority also deserves credit for the concessions it made and for agreeing to Burbank’s conditions. You can argue that it had no choice, given the recent court rulings in Burbank’s favor. But, as we’ve seen far too many times before, a lack of choices doesn’t always stop a bad choice.

Now is the time to pull together to build a safe, convenient terminal, work toward noise reduction and leave the longtime dissension where it belongs--in the past.

Burbank got everything it wanted: the same number of gates, a limit on square footage and a limit on future expansion.