Boston Sunday Globe, NorthWest section
June 29, 2003

Letter: Delivering real story on FedEx

You recently published an article on the possible arrival of FedEx at the Hanscom Field Airport, part of Massport’s proposed expansion plan. (“Hanscom, FedEx mull increased flights,” June 22nd.) We thank you for your coverage of this potentially disastrous possibility, but would like to point out a big gap in your story -- namely, the truck traffic FedEx would bring to the Battle Road (Rt. 2A).

FedEx says it wants one flight a day at Hanscom -- i.e., two daily operations, a landing and a takeoff. It says that 5 trucks would unload the plane upon arrival, and 9 more would load it up for departure. That’s 14 trucks altogether, each of which would be making a round trip to and from Hanscom, for a total of 28 truck trips on the Battle Road. These are not the little box trucks that FedEx drives around town -- they were described to us as 18-wheelers or other big freight trucks. That’s right -- a single FedEx flight would generate 28 daily 18-wheeler truck trips on the Battle Road. (All of this information was provided by Massport at the last HFAC
meeting.)

Furthermore, if granted its one flight to start with, FedEx could add two more without further review, for a total of three arrivals and three departures daily. (That’s the number envisaged in the 2015 high growth scenario in Massport’s Environmental Status and Planning Report.) This would increase the truck traffic to 84 trips a day!

Massport is suggesting that the trucks would be able to avoid the Battle Road by using the Air Force entrance to the airport. It is highly unlikely that the Air Force would allow large trucks with unscreened packages to come through its entrance in this post -9/11 age of heightened security.

Again, we thank you for your coverage of the Hanscom expansion controversy.

Jane Gharibian
Lexington

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