Residents weigh in on aircraft noise at Bob Hope Airport

Burbank resident Mike Moynahan said when his family lived on Evergreen Street in 1997, planes from Bob Hope Airport would shake the walls of their home during the night and wake his infant daughter.

He said the planes have gotten quieter, in general, but they still sometimes wake his daughter — now 16 — in their home on Jeffries Avenue, just outside the boundary of eligibility for the airport’s residential acoustic treatment program, which pays to insulate and soundproof homes near the airfield.

While the airport has a voluntary curfew from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. for commercial carriers, some planes may land during the curfew period under certain circumstances such as weather-related issues in other cities or when they’re rerouted from other airfields.

Moynahan and about a dozen other Burbank residents showed up Monday at the Buena Vista Library for a public workshop and hearing on proposed revisions to the airport’s noise compatibility program. He said he was hoping to hear the eligibility boundary for the program would be expanded so he could qualify, but he learned it won’t be — it’s shrinking.

“Which doesn’t change anything for me,” Moynahan said. “It just gives me less hope.”

A combination of “comparatively, measurably” quieter aircraft and reduced flight operations means aircraft noise does not penetrate into the community at the same levels it did in the past, said Mark Hardyment, the airport’s director of transportation and environmental programs.

As a result, the Federal Aviation Administration requires that the airport reduce the boundaries for its noise mitigation programs, he said.

Since 1997, the airport has paid for roughly $110 million in noise-mitigation upgrades to nearby homes — new doors and windows, beefed-up insulation, added weather stripping and central air conditioning — as part of its mitigation efforts.

The revised noise compatibility program calls for nearly $15 million more in mitigation efforts, said David Fitz, a consultant with Coffman Associates, the firm retained by the airport to conduct a noise study under federal rules. Much of that will involve residential upgrades, Fitz said, and about 80% of it will be eligible for federal grant funding.

The other 20% will be paid by the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority, which funds its share from fees charged to airport users, Hardyment said.

Some previous measures are being eliminated from the plan because they have been completed or are no longer deemed necessary, Fitz said. Added mitigations are being proposed, however, such as expanding the noise-proofing program to include multifamily properties. About 30 parcels with more than 160 units will be eligible for insulation, he said.

Only four members of the public spoke at the hearing, but several questioned the shrinking eligibility area. Laverne Thomas noted that while airport officials are citing reduced operations as a cause for the smaller noise footprint, they’re also working to increase air carrier service at the terminal through several ongoing marketing efforts.

Hardyment said the contours are based on what has already happened and a “reasonable expectation” of what will happen in a five-year look-ahead. He said that, in part, the airport’s efforts to attract more air carriers is about protecting its current level of operations.

However, he said, if they successfully increase operations, that would be captured in a subsequent noise study.

Fitz said studies are recommended every five to 10 years, but could be required if operations increased by 15% or — according to his “very, very ballpark” estimate — about 20,000 flights a year.

Moynahan said that response didn’t especially comfort him — he would have preferred every two years. He said the family has learned to live with the noise, and, in five years, it may be even less of a concern when his daughter is 21 and possibly out of the home.

“I’ll be 56 and losing more of my hearing, so it won’t bother me as much,” he said.

A draft of the noise study is available at https://bit.ly/1xV8yfY. Comments can be sent to Mark D. Hardyment, director of transportation and environmental programs, Bob Hope Airport, Part 150 NCP Comments, 2627 Hollywood Way, Burbank, CA 91505, or by email at mhardyment@bur.org.