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Logan to resume overnight takeoffs over the ocean; move should mean less noise for residents
By adamg on Tue, 01/06/2015 - 10:34am
State Sen. Will Brownsberger (2nd Suffolk and Middlesex) reports Logan Airport is resuming a noise-abatement takeoff system the FAA ordered it to stop last summer.
Basically, late at night, weather permitting, the airport tries do all of its landings and departures over the water. That means planes are flying in opposite directions onto adjacent runways. The traffic has to be timed to separate them adequately and maintain safety. This is feasible only late at night when traffic is low.
The "opposite direction runway operations" will resume Jan. 16 between roughly midnight and 5 a.m., Brownsberger says.
The FAA suspended this type of operation in June after two planes got too close for comfort near Washington Reagan National Airport.
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Comments
OMG YES
Thank you Jesus!
So tired of planes over my house until the wee hours of the morning! (I live in Chelsea, folks)
deleted
commented in the wrong place, sorry
And I'm sick and tired of people
who buy/rent property knowing full well there's an AIRPORT next door and then turn around and bit(h about the fact that planes are actually taking off and landing.
When did noise suddenly become the new evil of all evils anyway?
Maybe I should have mentioned the places in his district
The senator is from Watertown and he represents places such as Allston and Brighton - areas not traditionally considered "next door" to the airport.
It's been an issue here in Roslindale, again, not a place noted for its convenient location to terminals, and I was hopeful this would mean something for the wave of early morning flights we've been getting in recent months, but he mentioned a 5 a.m. cutoff and our alarm clocks in the sky are coming after that time.
Fun fact*
During the morning rush at Logan, there can be a plane taking off every 55 seconds.
*Fact is fun for airport aficionados but less fun for those living in the flight path
In Watertown too...
This fall and winter we've had planes well below 10K feet overhead, in the landing pattern, every 10 minutes or so. Usually when it's precipitating. I learned to recognize the plane roar as separate from the oil truck roar or construction equipment roar (louder but shorter).
Used to, in Somerville, we'd get planes overhead with specific wind patterns -- if the wind was crossways to my back porch, the planes would land/takeoff overhead. If it was directly onto the porch, they'd be coming in over the Pike (and well away from us).
Now, the planes seem to be consistently patterned over the Pike +-3 miles, which is a very wide glide path. Most of Newton, Watertown, Brookline, Cambridge, and about 2/3 of Boston fit into that wedge.
Glad they're able to route at least some flights back over the ocean.
I don't live near an airport, either
However, it is even odds that I will see my neighborhood/house on take off and landing at Logan.
Our windows rattle in bad weather because the planes are coming in under the cloud layer, but maybe 200 feet over us.
I'm >10 miles from Logan.
I'm awful at measuring distances too,
...but 200 feet sounds extremely unlikely, especially at a distance of > 10 miles from the airport.
For reference, the Hancock is 790 feet tall...200 feet would be around 15 floors up
There is no way any BOS traffic is at 200 ft. >10 miles out.
or we would have already heard about the crash [knocks on wood].
-
The planes at Castle Island (when winds are coming from the North) are at 400 ft, and those are on the very last leg of their final approach.
There's a pretty wide area
There's a pretty wide area that's affected, which is, coincidentally, the whole area that's most convenient to getting in and out of Boston. Even in Somerville, I have to pause a movie when a plane goes overhead, or I miss hearing 10-15 seconds of what's going on.
so?
Yeah, but CAPSRAGE! Need to be mad at things!
I live a stone's throw away from the airport, but airplane noise was far worse when I'd stay the night in the South End. The noise isn't solely an East Boston issue by any stretch.
When did noise become a bad thing? I don't know, when humans first were able to hear loud noises? When humans were able to hear said noises while sleeping? When lack of sleep caused a wide array of health issues? Somewhere along that timeline.
Why do you care? If the
Why do you care? If the landings can be done at night over the ocean, then let them be done that way and cut people trying to sleep some slack. And it affects people well beyond the streets closest to the airport to boot.
Exactly. Why DO people care
Exactly. Why DO people care if plane noise is reduced for residents? I'll tell you why: because some people like to bitch about everything and anything and are opposed to residents taking the initiative do make their lives and the lives of their neighbors a little bit better. It's the anti-NIMBY crowd in full force. Usually it's people who don't even live in the city.
Kiss off
Seriously. I take it you live NOWHERE near the airport? Do you know what its like every 7 and a half minutes to have a large jet land over your house? Yeah I have to pause TV also because it so loud.
And yes I'm very well aware that my home is in a runway path. I knew this the day I signed the closing papers. And Mr Smarty Pants anon, if you read the article you'd know that INCREASED land landings because they could no longer land over the ocean due to a restriction. So the noise level has increased since I moved into my condo.
Come over one day and we'll sit in my back yard when they are taking off all afternoon. You won't be able to hear yourself think. And after about an hour you'll want to leave because your ears hurt.
Yeah I am THAT close..
Grew up "under a runway"
The main runway for the Tulsa airport went pretty much over our house. Even more fun, the Air Force Reserve base (or some such) would occasionally do low-level bomber training runs over our house. Once a commercial airliner crashed (everyone killed) about half a mile from our house.
noise stinks!
I live in Roxbury, and the airplane noise can be unbearable at times! Sometimes it wakes me up at 6am (on New Year's Day, it woke me up at 5:30am). If I try to go to sleep before midnight, it often keeps me awake. In nice weather, if I'm talking to a neighbor in the yard, we have to stop talking when a plane flies overhead. Anything that can be done to minimize this is great.
Noise is a real quality of life issue for all of us.
It's not just those near the airport
I live in Roxbury and the noise gets pretty loud and frequent. Not so bad during the day, but pretty bad at night. Other communities not near the airport, like West Roxbury, Roslindale are also affected. It' not just noise either; it makes more sense to route planes away from heavily populated areas. Excessive noise is a human problem for millennium. Sounds like you're the NIMBY one here - bet you fly out of that airport and leave it others to deal with the consequences of having an airport. This solves the problem for planes, the airport and neighbors (even fatherr-away ones) Why a win-win solution should make you sick and tired is kind of douchey.
I grew up in Winthrop with
I grew up in Winthrop with the runway (literally) at the end of my street, so my tolerance for noise, including the noise from the revving of jet engines, and the smell of diesel and burnt rubber are quite familiar. That said, my dad worked at Logan for 30 years and following lots of protests and continuous lobbying, Massport provided lots of jobs, funding and soundproofing to our town. Our families knew what they signed up for living there and understood the costs and benefits of living close to Boston/Logan/work. Most Logan neighbors also know they need to stay on top if Massport to prevent things from getting worse.
I didn't expect the noise to be as loud as it has been in Milton (where I live now) and unless people complain, as they're now doing in Milton, Massport won't reroute planes or move them over the water.
Moving them over the water, when possible, helps all Logan neighbors without materially harming Logan's operations so rather than criticizing those focused on unnecessary Logan impacts, folks should celebrate this program.
East Boston resident for
East Boston resident for nearly 50 years same house, and planes have been flying over East Boston neighborhood as long as I can remember, same flight path during takeoff , I do remember the loud DC 9s the Plane with 2 engines in the back,thank god those planes don't fly out of Logan anymore, they do not make them anymore.
Planes over the water, which part Winthrop or over Boston proper?
Living in the flight path of hell
I live in West Roxbury and sometime last year Logan started routing outbound air traffic over our neighborhood. The noise starts early in the morning, continues late at night. It causes stress and headaches. When I first moved here this never happened.
The flight path is such that you hear each plane coming, it's a high pitch sound of a jet engine from the front, then it passes over and you hear the rumble of the jet engine from the rear, loud as hell, and it continues for five minutes unless the jet changes course. In rush hours, the deafening noise is non stop.
They really shouldn't be routing traffic over Boston's most densely populated neighborhoods.
It makes sense from the air
Look at a map of the rivers, the wetlands, the parklands, and you would realize that they are, in fact, avoiding the most densely populated areas.
I've noticed on take off that planes that end up over The Fells tend to gain their altitude over Bell Isle Marsh, Breakheart, the Middlesex Fells.
Ones coming in from the North drop pretty low over the Fells, while coming in south and West drop down over the Neponset.
Maybe to the north
But anybody from Roslindale or West Roxbury will tell you how, when the wind is right, or wrong, departing airplanes basically follow Washington Street out of the city.
How much parkland and wetlands there
I took a look at the nifty map someone linked to, and those vectors come in over a lot of parkland as well as the neighborhoods.
I've actually come in over your area a lot more than I've flown out. Not sure why. Through the south suburbs/urbs, over the river, swing wide over the ocean, and down.
Interesting theory, but I
Interesting theory, but I think you can find some parkland within any of the areas affected by Logan. It doesn't mean those areas aren't densely populated. It just means that even urban areas happen to have some parkland surrounded by lots of development. If planes flew low over the middle of the city, you could say franklin park is there, but it's an exception to the rule of thickly settled areas there.
For example, wide swaths of Eastie, Revere and Winthrop are directly in the flight paths, in addition to Belle Isle Marsh (which happens to border all of them). Try Yirrell Beach in Winthrop, or even Winthrop Beach, and you'll see a plane every few minutes over some of the most densely populated parts of town. Same goes for most of Eastie and Beachmont in Revere.
As for the Neponset, it's no mighty Mississippi. It's a pretty small narrow river, particularly along Milton, Dorchester and Mattapan where the planes fly. The River is a small patch between densely populated neighborhoods on either side.
To the extent they can put flights safely over the water and away from residential neighborhoods, it's a win for everyone, avoiding the need to debate how dense an urban or suburban neighborhood may be.
We used to take non
We used to take non suspecting lasses over to Saratoga street on the bridge, and weo johnny the car got lit up good........
most densely populated neighborhoods
Not to minimize your noise issue, but ... if you live in West Roxbury, isn't that Boston's least densely populated neighborhood?
Oh please... West Roxbury,
Oh please... West Roxbury, the only noise you West Roxbury people can hear from a distance are the people in neighboring Brookline counting their money!!
Airplane noise in West Roxbury.. What? from 7000 feet in the air, If you lived in East Boston , you can hear the planes idling on the taxi way, I can also hear twin prop engines to 747 engines roaring, you can also smell and breath in the Jet exhaust fumes, explains the cancer rate in Eastie.
Massport can pay for fancy parks with Brick walkways and light posts, but there will always be the aroma of Jet exhaust fumes in the neighborhood.
Airplanes disrupt peoples lives in East Boston, try sleeping on a Sunday morning at 5am, every 5 minutes a plane takes off, waking up the entire neighborhood.
Sorry, I can't hear your whine over the sound of the jets
Nobody's saying people in the southwest corner of Boston have it worse than people in East Boston. But, you obviously don't live in West Roxbury, Roslindale or JP, because otherwise you wouldn't have posted something so ridiculous, since you would know exactly what it's like to be awakened at 5:30 a.m. by a jet - followed by another, and another and another for 45 minutes.
Nitpick
It's actually the same runway:
Great news!
They don't keep me awake, but can wake me in the morning when there's a place taking off every 5 minutes or so. Yea!
Here are the charts.......
If your interested in where the traffic is going....arrivals and departures have links near the bottom.
http://www.airnav.com/airport/KBOS
Massport - sharing the noise
Sound travels much better over water.
How to file formal noise complaints re: Logan
Logan has a website which provides a time delayed animated graphic of jets leaving and approaching. By clicking on a given jet at a selected time and date it is possible to note the jet's identifying information. That information can be sent to Logan as a noise complaint.
It's a good way to create evidence of when Logan is causing egregious noise pollution.
http://www.massport.com/environment/environmental-reporting/noise-abatem...
In response to the person asking when did noise become a big issue: Perhaps when the following started:
Boomboom cars that made one wonder whether the driver head is shoved so far up their but that they need window shaking volume to hear anything
Cell addicts whose conversations are audible on the other side of the street, bus or subway
Noise bleed from earbuds on public transportation
Cars and trucks that announce their presence whenever locked and unlocked
Vehicle alarms that continue blaring for 5 minutes
Of course someone will think: Well you live in the city; if you don't like noise move to the country. To that person I say if you like the noise of a circus why don't you move to the circus. You would probably find the Amazing Magnificent Smarter than Human Beings Monkey Brigade tossing feces at you when they got tired of your yammering on a cell phone.
FAA routes aircraft, not Massport
I realize that many people commenting on here know this, but it is clear that some do not. Massport is the best friend people seeking noise mitigation have because the control tower (FAA) would otherwise make routing decisions based only on safety and their convenience even in situations when it was possible to safely route aircraft in a less noisy pattern (which is not always the case, hence departures from Rwys 27 and 33L over heavily populated areas).
Now, folks...
I grew up on the top of a hill in Beachmont. Planes regularly flew as low as a couple of hundred feet from the roof of my house. And I grew up to be the well adjusted, cheerful person you know and love today.
Polar bears are crying and dying
at this news! All the extra greenhouse gas produced circling around over the ocean is killing more cute polar bears and baby seals with global warming! Greenpeace should protest selfish, thoughtless humans. White fur matters!
;-)