John Wayne’s Noise Curfew Faces Threat

A curfew barring nighttime jet flights at John Wayne Airport could succumb to the pressing demands of more passengers and cargo if a new airport at El Toro isn’t built, according to a consultant working with Orange County airport planners.

The curfew would have to be lifted to accommodate the projected growth in local airport use by 2020 if John Wayne remains the only commercial airport in Orange County, an analysis completed late last year concludes.

The airport handles about 7.5 million passengers a year, a number that would more than triple--surging to 25 million--under the county’s ultimate “build-out” scenario for John Wayne. That plan also calls for condemning 700 acres around the 500-acre airport and extending a runway over a lowered San Diego Freeway.

“You’d need to eliminate the curfew” to handle the increased traffic, consultant Warren Sprague of P&D; Aviation said this week. Cargo flights, for instance, are typically scheduled between midnight and dawn.

Sprague’s conclusions--triggered by the court-ordered release of planning documents last week--raise new questions about the county’s ability to withstand pressure to provide more airport space.

So far, county supervisors are committed to building a new commercial airport at El Toro, one that would handle as many as 28.8 million passengers a year by 2020. There would be no curfew at El Toro, though planners have suggested restricting nighttime flights to quieter jets.

But increasing opposition by residents in South County resulted in a ballot measure approved last March that could scuttle those plans. The measure, approved overwhelmingly by voters, is under judicial review.

But without El Toro, John Wayne Airport is the only game in town--a particularly ominous situation for nearby residents, since a limit on the number of passengers, as well as other restrictions, expires in 2005.

County officials insist that the airport’s curfew, which bars commercial takeoffs from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. and arrivals from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m., can remain in place even after the passenger cap lifts.

Others aren’t so confident. A 1990 federal law eliminated local airport restrictions such as curfews. In the last 10 years, no airport has been granted a curfew by the Federal Aviation Administration.

The focus on El Toro and John Wayne has intensified in recent days with the release of an economic study prepared for the Southern California Assn. of Governments. The study concluded that the controversial expansion of Los Angeles International Airport isn’t critical for regional economic growth--as long as other area airports, such as El Toro, are built.

Residents near LAX seized on the SCAG report as ammunition that other parts of Southern California must handle more of the load, particularly Orange County. The city of El Segundo has sued Los Angeles over plans to expand LAX beyond its current 65 million passengers a year.

El Toro airport backers said demand for airports is increasing in Southern California, and that more runways and terminal space must be built. Orange County residents and visitors are expected to account for about 30 million annual airport trips by 2020, about a fifth of the total predicted for Southern California, according to SCAG forecasts.

“You can’t stick your head in the sand and pretend the demand is going to go away,” said David Ellis, a consultant for pro-El Toro forces in Newport Beach. “We haven’t built what we need to in this basin since LAX was expanded for the 1984 Olympics. Something has to give.”

Opponents of an El Toro airport question the government’s figures, saying they are inflated to justify more growth. But they agree that neither Los Angeles nor Orange County would automatically suffer economically if airports aren’t built or expanded.

“I would say that we agree with them that you don’t need an airport for an economic engine,” said Meg Waters, spokeswoman for the El Toro Reuse Planning Authority, a coalition of eight cities opposed to the airport.

“What we disagree on is where airports should be built. Our philosophy is, put the airports where they’re wanted and needed, not where they’re not,” she said.

El Toro foes insist that John Wayne Airport can handle Orange County’s future needs without condemning more land. A smaller expansion plan analyzed by the county predicts the current airport could accommodate 14 million passengers a year and about 180,000 tons of cargo by 2020. The curfew could stay put, with about 242 takeoffs a day.

Just the same, if El Toro is shelved, the full expansion of John Wayne Airport would force it to become a round-the-clock facility, Sprague said.