Airport Upgrade Plans Stuck in Holding Pattern

Condos are rising, restaurants and boutiques are in the works. There’s a big, world-class ski mountain out back. But Mammoth Mountain’s efforts to soar with the destination-resort glitterati still lacks a key element: an airport fit for big commercial jetliners.

New complaints by environmentalists have set back until at least next year local leaders’ efforts to expand the airport. Owners of the ski resort want it enlarged to accommodate jets capable of disgorging hordes of vacationers from places like Dallas and Chicago.

Though the Federal Aviation Administration earlier this year approved a $28.7-million grant to lengthen the runway, conservationists are girding for a legal challenge that could put Mammoth’s airport dreams in a holding pattern.

Three of the most formidable environmental groups in the nation--Earthjustice, the Sierra Club and the Natural Resources Defense Council--have filed a lawsuit challenging the airport expansion, arguing that environmental assessments have been inadequate.

As envisioned, the expansion would add a big terminal while extending the runway by nearly a quarter of a mile and widening it by 50 feet to accommodate new-generation jetliners like the Boeing 757. Four flights a day are anticipated initially.

A bigger airport, environmentalists say, could trample the eastern Sierra outback while ushering in urban-like sprawl, hemming in migrating deer and threatening fragile fish and fowl. Several state agencies, including the Department of Fish and Game and the attorney general’s office, have registered concerns.

Faced with such opposition, the FAA has opted to slow the

process. Construction at the airport, expected to begin last spring, has been put off until next year while more rigorous environmental assessments are conducted.

It isn’t the first delay.

Mammoth Lakes has tried for about 15 years to expand the airport, which is about 10 miles east of the ski mountain.

The airport for decades has hosted small carriers, mostly out of Southern California. But in the mid-1990s, as attendance at the ski mountain tumbled, the last of the air carriers pulled out.

Town leaders have made pilgrimages to Washington to lobby bureaucrats and lawmakers. It paid off in January with the FAA’s expansion grant.

“These commercial flights are what will make this town go,” said Bill Manning, Mammoth Yosemite Airport manager. “Air service is the key--what we need around here to spread out the peaks and valleys of the local economy. It’s the economic driver that will make the town successful.”

Environmentalists worry that an airport expansion could erode the region’s charms for man and beast.

In a letter to the FAA in November, the California Department of Fish and Game warned expansion might threaten the Owens tui chub, an endangered fish, as well as the sage grouse, a turkey-like bird under consideration for protected status.

The agency also raised the possibility that planes could strike huge raptors, including endangered bald eagles. There are concerns about tainted air from jet exhaust and fuel spills polluting water.

“This project has the potential to profoundly and permanently affect the regions’ natural resources,” a deputy for Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer warned in a letter to the FAA.

Owen Maloy, a Sierra Club leader in Mammoth, believes a better solution would be to expand the Bishop airport. Thirty miles southeast and a good 3,000 feet lower in elevation, Bishop would be less apt to be hit by the nasty winter weather that could make the Mammoth airport tough for takeoffs and landings, he said.

Maloy questioned passenger projections he considers wildly optimistic. He also suggested the town of Mammoth Lakes could take a financial hit. The town would be largely responsible for the $10-million cost of replacing the cramped terminal with a 30,000-square-foot jet port.

“This town has always thought if they could just get air travel they could compete with Aspen,” Maloy said. “I think it’s an inferiority complex.”

Mammoth Mountain officials did consider Bishop, but decided to stick with Mammoth Yosemite Airport because it was further along in the expansion process.

The resort’s bullish leaders believe they will draw plenty of air passengers, keep the airlines and townsfolk happy, and avoid serious damage to the environment.

“We’d like to avoid further delays,” said Rusty Gregory, chief executive at the Mammoth Mountain Ski Area. “But we don’t want to see the approval process go any faster than the law allows.”

Proponents hope to begin construction in spring, with work completed in fall 2003. But the opposition of environmental groups could cause delays.

“That costs time and money,” Manning said. “They’d like us to give up.”