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AIRPORT COMMUNITIES COALITION |
September 8, 1999
To the Editor:
It’s never too late to save over a billion dollars in public funds. It’s not too late to ease freeway gridlock. And it’s not too soon to provide Puget Sound residents with cheaper, more convenient air travel options.
Despite the constant propaganda disseminated by the Port of Seattle, the third runway at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport is far from an accomplished fact. Due to rapidly escalating costs, the Port has delayed the planned opening to 2006. Escalating costs, current court appeals, newly discovered wetlands and the listing of salmon as an endangered species all call into serious question whether the third runway will ever be built.
These delays provide the region and Port Commissioners with an opportunity to re-evaluate old assumptions. Thoughtful political leaders must occasionally rethink basic assumptions in light of changed circumstances and have the courage to change direction if warranted. Alternatives for providing added regional air capacity now make more sense than ever for the following reasons:
- Why expand Sea-Tac if you can’t get there? Most people aren’t worried about a few minutes of delay in flying into Sea-Tac, but about the one hour delay in getting to and from the region’s only airport due to increasing traffic congestion.
- The proposed runway is still too close to the other runways to be used independently for simultaneous landings in bad weather – severely limiting its usefulness.
- The runway will cost in excess of $773 million (well over one billion dollars with bond interest costs), by far the single most expensive runway in the history of the United States.
- New ground radar, satellite navigation, and onboard technologies, currently used by many airlines, will permit significantly increased air traffic in bad weather conditions at a fraction of the cost.
- Five of the nine airlines commenting on the airport’s application to increase passenger facility charges indicated that the third runway is too expensive and/or not needed. The airlines cited an industry study showing only 30 seconds of the 6.5 minute average delay in getting into Sea-Tac was due to local conditions that would be alleviated by a third runway.
- Increased air traffic in and out of Sea-Tac will significantly add to noise impacts on communities under the “4 Post Plan” such as Queen Anne, Beacon Hill, Magnolia, Ravenna and Mercer Island.
- Increased congestion, noise, and unmitigated growth in central Puget Sound will destroy the very quality of life that attracted residents and businesses here in the first place.
Convenient cost-effective alternatives exist. Supplemental regional airports are common all over the world. Look at the San Francisco area, with Oakland and San Jose airports, or Los Angeles with Orange County and Ontario. Supplemental airports provide customer choice, lower parking costs, quicker baggage recovery, and proximity to areas of growing population with resulting reduction in traffic congestion. Supplemental airports are not built because of some centralized planning agency mandate, but because private industry sees a market opportunity and provides a needed service. Airlines are already examining using Paine Field for supplemental service. The Puget Sound Regional Council’s own technical review committee and consultants recognized several sites in Snohomish and Pierce counties that were suitable and passed initial environmental and economic review. All of these options were discarded for parochial political reasons, not for cost or environmental concerns.
Sometimes the best thing is for government to do nothing. By massively subsidizing Sea-Tac expansion with public funds, the region will undercut private market forces. It would cripple the natural forces at work to develop supplemental fields to best serve the burgeoning populations of Thurston, Snohomish and Pierce Counties.
Hundreds of thousands of residents in South King County accept Sea-Tac Airport in its current configuration. But, we are determined to hold the Port of Seattle to its earlier promises not to build a third runway. Our communities grew and expanded based on that premise. It’s time for other counties to accept their share of future air transportation growth as well as the benefits. It’s time for the Port Commission to seriously examine new technologies in conjunction with other runway alternatives. Please join us in stopping this billion dollar boondoggle and help promote consumer options, lower costs, less traffic, and regional equity by writing your local, state and federal elected officials.
Sincerely yours,
Bob Sheckler, Chair
Airport Communities Coalition