The Concord Journal
July 6, 2000
Subcomittee
urges moratorium on more flights at Hanscom
By Barbara
Forster
Correspondent
The Hanscom Area Towns Environmental
Subcommittee is recommending a
moratorium be placed on commercial airline
operations at Hanscom Air Field.
The committee's report to HATS last month
concluded that current commercial
operations at the field far exceed GEIR
(Generic Environmental Impact
Review) projections for the years 2000, 2001,
and next year will go beyond
projections for 2010.
"It's disingenuous
forMassport officials to say we've studied this in the
GEIR, when it's clear
that further study is warranted," said Bedford's
Michael Bahtiarian, who
chairs the subcommittee.
The subcommittee recommended that HATS "request
that the MEPA Unit and
Massport place a moratorium on approvals of additional
commercial flights,
or any other projects related to commercial flights"
until an up-to-date
Environmental Impact Report is prepared for commercial
ops at the field.
Although Massport representative Richard Walsh did not
dispute the numbers,
he pointed out that the scenarios are not predictors of
what will happen at
the field. Instead, they are used to discuss the
environmental impacts of a
particular condition should it occur. "The GEIR
says 'by the year'; it does
not say, for example 'at' 2008 something would
only occur," he said. "The
GEIR is not a business document. It is a planning
tool tha discusses
impacts and MEPA is interested in that
analysis."
"Clearly the GEIR is not a crystal ball," added Bahtiarian.
"But if you
look at 2010 and compare what was thought might happen next year
you find
it's at least two times greater that 2010. They haven't done an
adequate
look (at these numbers). By 2010, two GEIRs would have been
conducted."
According to the report, current daily Shuttle America
operations exceed
moderate GEIR projections for the year 2000 by 11 percent.
Announced
operations for 2001 (this includes proposed service to LaGuardia by
Shuttle
America and US Air) will exceed the GEIR's moderate growth
scenario
projections by 131 percent and robust projections by 27
percent.
For passengers per day, the numbers are even greater. Current
Shuttle
America passengers are already 192 percent greater than moderate
growth
scenario projections for 2000 and 41 percent greater than the
robust
scenario level for 2000. Announced service levels starting in 2001
would be
464 percent greater than the 2001 moderate growth scenario
projection and
165 percent greater than the robust scenario in the same
year.
The committee used arriving and departing passengers data because,
states
the report, "it is a better indicator of ground traffic which is
affected by
both arrivals and departures." The industry parameter is
enplanements.
Passenger data is based on aircraft seat numbers and aircraft
occupancy or
load factors as reported in the GEIR.
Bahtiarian stressed
that data came from the GEIR. "And we verified it
through various sources,"
he added. "It's 99.9 percent accurate."
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