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The incompetent, lying bastards who run Massport
By adamg on Mon, 06/22/2009 - 8:08am
Hey, remember the new runway that was supposed to reduce delays at Logan and not increase the number of jets flying over East Boston? Yeah, Massport got it wrong.
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Comments
This is to all those people
This is to all those people who decry nimbys on this site and others: This is what happens when you allow something to happen against your better judgement. People will say anything to get what they want, and then switch the story when what they want has been accomplished and it becomes too late to do anything about it.
The runway was needed -
The runway was needed - tough beans. People were just posting about the benefits regional planning on this site. This was regional planning. The most good for the most people and all.
Blame the other NIMBYs then
The ones who think that the airbase in Bedford isn't a good place for planes to fly out of because it might rattle their precious historic windows.
Not only that, but who
Not only that, but who seriously has problems with air traffic noise besides those right next to Logan?
Planes fly over southie regally when the wind conditions are right, and while they aren't completely silent, the noise is very minimal. A passing car makes more racket.
I've also heard complaints coming from Somerville.... where they're flying several thousand feet overhead. Seriously guys?
It's a city. You want the quite of nature, move to Orange or sound proof your house and keep the damn windows closed.
Must be nice living in the suburbs
Because here in Roslindale we have days when the planes are loud enough to wake you up when they start flying overhead at 6:30 a.m.
Adam, I live in South
Adam,
I live in South Boston.
I guess I must just be a heavy sleeper or it's usually very quiet out there in Roslindale..., but planes from Logan never wake me, even when they're using the runway that has them going right over castle island / East-south Boston.
My apologies for the suburban snark, then
But as somebody who once lived under a JFK approach (we used to go over to this particular place to see the jets scream right overhead, sort of like Castle Island, only without the fried clams), I know loud planes, and those planes are, sometimes, really loud (yes, our backwoods part of Roslindale is normally pretty quiet). What's interesting is that it's always the planes taking off. Although we get planes on their final approach in the afternoon sometimes, they seems to be higher up (maybe they flight out over the ocean first?).
I live a few house lots from
I live a few house lots from the Amtrak line. The trains literally shake the foundation of the house every day. I'm also near enough to the Readville train yards that I hear the boxcars crashing together like they're setting off hand grenades - at 3:30 AM. All year. I've lived in Roslindale, and trust me, this is much louder than planes going over Rosi. This is 'can't hear the television with the windows open' loud.
That's life. The railroad has the right to use the tracks, and there's nothing the town of Dedham can do about it. So I live with it.
Get a job
You won't have that problem anymore.
*snort*
You win the internet.
http://1smootshort.blogspot.com
Airplane noise is minimal in Southie? Since when?
I recall taking my parents to Castle Island for a guided tour, and the leader having to constantly interrupt his spiel because he couldn't be heard over the noise from airplanes flying over about once every 3 minutes.
That's part of the charm ...
Like late lunchtime when this British Airways 747 comes in for a landing (on Saturday, we got to see it from the inner harbor, on our way to Georges Island).
Somerville and Medford
I just love it when the weather is wet or the wind is blowing a certain way. So nice when the windows rattle and I have to stop a conversation each time a plane passes.
Too many digits in that
I can tell from the ability of a former flight attendent friend to read tail numbers that they go over my house in Medford at about 1,000 feet sometimes. The planes come right up the Mystic Valley and turn over the woodlands. They are climbing, but they don't make much altitude by the time they get over us, near the fells, in certain weather conditions. If there is a substantial cloud ceiling, this can get VERY loud.
I have been a passenger on planes taking that particular flight path right over my house and been able to pick out a specific feature on my property because of the low altitude.
You must have some very loud cars with jake brakes around your neighborhood. I have measured jet noise on my street at 85-95dB.
Some people HEAR the planes
Some people HEAR the planes others FEEL the planes. You hit the nail right on the head. For the people directly affected its not the noise that bothers them, its the vibrations that rattle the windows and knock dishes off the counter.
To be honest, that I can
To be honest, that I can respect (to a point: you do live in a city and there are things you have to get used to).
But at the same time...I don't see how rerouting the planes over people who can't afford lawyers is going to actually solve the damn problem.
The people who are affected
The people who are affected the most can not afford lawyers and that was the point. East Boston, Chelsea and the parts of Somerville affected are not exactly upper class areas. You haven't heard a plane until you've been in a house/apartment right under a flight path. A friend of the family can not even keep pictures on the wall because it is so bad.
To be fair, you need a
To be fair, you need a better cupboard if your dishes are rattling to the floor.
:)
East Boston has a genuine
East Boston has a genuine complaint.
Cambridge and Somerville, I'm sorry, they can stuff it. I live in Somerville and I've never heard anything that indicates airplane noise is anything more than a pet peeve for the whiners. I also dislike the solution. If jets can't fly over Somerville, well, they'll have to fly somewhere. That's why NIMBY sucks.
This, also having lived in
This, also having lived in somerville and Medford.
I also know someone who worked in the Cambridge government, and their most vocal complainers of planes were also the most vocal complainers of insert frivolous agenda here, and big tin foil hatters.
There's noise and then there's noise
Living in Winthrop for close to ten years I became very familiar with air traffic noise. It was a nuisance more than anything but you learned to work around it. Point Shirley, Cottage Hill and the Court Road neighborhoods were/are the most affected - the rest of town was OK. Honestly, I found the black silty dust from the jet fuel to be a worse issue. Whether the windows were open or closed it found a way into the house.
I now live on a streetcar line and it seems much louder than the aircraft ever were. I wonder if those Eastie residents along the Blue Line corridor feel the same.
airport noise and NIMBYs
We don't seem to know much about noise, and whether certain frequencies affect you differently than others, even at decibel levels that are supposed to be acceptable. I read about a study in Germany, where an airport was moving from one site to another. The kids at the old site had a jump in their reading levels after the airport was gone, while the kids in the new site had a corresponding drop when the airport moved in. So these things affect us in ways that the law does not currently contemplate.
As for squashing the residents for regional planning, this is another example of how public works projects wind up excluding and destroying the public. As long as we designate authority to some over-agency we will lose connection with personal and individual rights.
Regional Planning
I get so sick of the complaints about "regional VERSUS local" around here. Sorry, folks, but it isn't a dichotomy - local is nested within regional.
Regional planning, done right, addresses local issues without being dominated by microlocal issues. The idea that local and regional needs are separate is laughbly false - you can't live in your little town world and pretend that is all that matters because that little town world is dominated by an economy that operates on a much larger scale. You can't live in your house or buy food if you don't have a job! You can't stay there if you can't find a job or can't get to a job! You won't be able to stay around the entire region if there are no jobs because planning is so balkanized around localized microwants that the entire regional economy is stifled.
In short, regional planning itself is NOT the problem. Regional planning that does not incorporate citizen participation at early stages is the problem. Regional planning hamstrung and held hostage by absurd reactive demands from local groups that refuse to participate at the early stages and direct the proces, and then grandstand and yell "but nobody asked ME" and generate nothing but noise, trouble, and candidates for local office is also a problem.
Regional planning in and of itself? Not the problem. Had proper regional planning been allowed to take place, Hanscomb would be a regional airport. The problem with regional planning around here, if you can call it that, is that there is no culture that supports doing it right - it becomes dominated by hacks and politicians rather than planners and participants.
Candidates for local office
Candidates for local office represent the local people, they only complain about stuff because while they are on the street people complain about it to them. Many of these people do not go out and participate in these studies but will tell the person at the door what they see as the problem. I am not saying it is right or wrong, but it just is. There is a reason why we vote for elected officials, and that is so we do not have to deal with every issue that comes up, that is their job. I realize you may not agree with them, but cutting them out of the system cuts the people out of the system.
That sound pretty tin-foil
That sound pretty tin-foil to be. Got credible links to this "report"?
People on the net also claim the world is flat, so you excuse me for taking this with a grain of salt
flat world internet
How do we bounce the internet off the satellites in orbit over the flat earth?
I like turtles. It's flying
I like turtles.
It's flying turtles in this case... not the one holding up a flat world.
Well I would think that the
Well I would think that the process would be easier on a flat world. In fact I guess you would not even need satellites you would just put repeaters on the tallest mountains and that would do the trick since everything is a straight line in a flat world.
You can do all the regional planning you want
You can do regional planning 'til the cows come home, but bottom line is, nobody wants an airport in their backyard. Getting approval for a f*&^ing bike path is hard enough. No matter how much you "plan", you're going to end up with a bunch of pissed off people. So, please tell me what your regional planning will accomplish with regards to Logan. Logan is where it is, and is our major airport. It needed the runway running NW because the wind blows from the NW a significant number of days. They did what they needed to do to alleviate the operational problems they had when the wind blew NW.
Really, is that what it
Really, is that what it is?
I've seen this buildup on my car in South Boston, but always though it was the coal fired electricity plant across from Black Falcon.