Officials Try to Limit Air Traffic Over Rose Bowl

What began as a neighborhood concern about congestion high above the Rose Bowl during major events has become an issue in the corridors of City Hall, Congress and the Federal Aviation Administration.

City officials, state lawmakers and Pasadena’s congressman are lobbying the FAA to severely restrict planes above major Rose Bowl events such as the Women’s World Cup Final, which could draw a capacity crowd of 94,000 Saturday.

Ironically, officials say, no one will fly low over the Rose Bowl that day because the Secret Service is expected to invoke a regulation that forbids such low air traffic above events attended by the president, vice president or the first lady. One of them may attend the soccer final, police said.

“If they’ll do it for the president, why not for the people,” asked Emina Drakjy, a Pasadena resident who lives on the eastern rim of the Arroyo Seco.

At each big game or event, helicopters, blimps, and banner-towing airplanes swarm above the stadium like bees around a hive.

With the Rose Bowl wedged in a canyon between two residential neighborhoods, some Pasadena homeowners worry that an airplane may plunge into their backyards.

“I think it’s amazing we haven’t had an accident yet,” said Lee Zanteson, president of the Linda Vista-Annandale neighborhood association, at his home on the Arroyo Seco’s western edge just above the Rose Bowl.

The debate in Pasadena comes as federal officials say they are examining how to better maintain safety in the airspace above sporting events and around ballooning rallies and aerial displays.

“Those events do cause a potential safety issue for . . . aircraft,” John Walker, FAA director of airspace management, said from Washington.

Walker said the FAA is “close to making some recommendations” after six months of reviewing the use of temporary flight restrictions and other solutions. He declined to give specifics.

After seeing the Rose Bowl from a helicopter, Rep. James E. Rogan (R-Glendale) wants the FAA to ensure that all planes, except police and media, be above 2,500 feet if they are within 1.5 miles of the Rose Bowl whenever 40,000 people are expected.

He says the temporary flight restrictions are needed about eight times a year, when crowds are so big and parking lots so full that there are no safe places for planes to land in an emergency.

In a June 24 letter to FAA Administrator Jane Garvey, Rogan said sightseeing flights and aerial advertisers over events have “created unsafe congestion . . . and greatly increased the possibility of a midair collision.”

At a recent meeting with Rose Bowl neighbors, representatives of California’s two U.S. senators, Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, pledged to support the Rogan proposal.

However, those who fly the two-seater planes that typically tow banners up to 200 feet long above the stadium say critics exaggerate the danger.

They say regulation is not needed and that the issue arose only because a few residents are annoyed about the sound of the planes and are now trying to make it a safety issue.

Flying over a Rose Bowl event, said banner-tow pilot Tom King, “is a whole lot safer than driving on the 5 Freeway at six in the morning.”

As many as two dozen planes have flown over the stadium at the same time without incident for several years, said King, president of the Southern California Aerial Advertising Assn.

Besides, King added, “there are plenty of safe places to land,” such as a riverbed near the stadium.

Special regulations ban flights over the White House and a few national security hot spots. They also severely limit the altitude and direction of flights over the Grand Canyon and parts of Hawaii. But stadiums have no permanent rules.

State Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Burbank) said that what is good for the Grand Canyon is good for the Rose Bowl.

“The stadium’s unique situation deserves special attention,” he said.

Many stadiums are close enough to a metropolitan airport to fall within the regulated airspace. Pasadena is not one of those stadiums. Only planes above 3,000 feet come under Burbank airport’s jurisdiction, officials said.

No local government can restrict access to airspace. Under federal law, that power resides with the FAA, which has granted temporary flight restrictions at the Rose Bowl for Super Bowls, the 1994 World Cup soccer events and the January 1999 Rose Bowl game. Those restrictions do not apply to news helicopters and planes.

However, FAA officials say they rarely grant temporary restrictions for events and prefer to limit their use to disasters or law enforcement activity.

Instead, the FAA first seeks voluntary compliance. For instance, when concerts are in progress at the Hollywood Bowl, the FAA asks pilots to voluntarily avoid the area and white searchlights are activated at the venue as a reminder. Those provisions have proved successful, officials said.

But at the 1998 Rose Bowl game, the FAA refused to grant a temporary restriction and, Pasadena police say, a DC-3 with tourists flew over the stadium at 1,000 feet.

East Arroyo resident Anne A. Opotowsky said that kind of flyover is exactly what homeowners don’t want to see again. “We’re talking about keeping out the planes with the Doritos banners and sightseers. This is a no-brainer,” she said. “If two or three planes can hit each other over the Grand Canyon, why not over the Rose Bowl?”