TagRegional Commission On Airport Affairs(43)

This document traces the history of regional air transportation planning in Washington State from 1942 to 1997, covering key milestones such as the original selection of the Bow Lake airport site, runway expansions, and noise-related lawsuits against the Port of Seattle. It highlights repeated policy decisions—including the 1973 Sea-Tac Communities Plan and the 1985 Master Plan Update—that explicitly ruled out new runways and major site expansions at Sea-Tac International Airport. The chronology also documents growing community concerns about aircraft noise, vibration, and smoke, reflected in legal actions and environmental impact studies throughout the period.

This collection of essays and timeline entries from HistoryLink.org traces the full history of Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, from its origins as a World War II-era civilian airport built by the Port of Seattle to the complex debates of the 1980s–2000s over adding a third runway. Key topics include the airport's rapid growth during the jet age, the economic disruptions of the Boeing Bust, and the federal deregulation of airlines in 1978. A central focus is the prolonged public and political battle over noise impacts and runway expansion, which drove up the third runway's projected cost from $430 million to $1.1 billion and delayed its completion by nearly a decade.

Community groups C.A.S.E. and the Airport Communities Coalition have appealed Sea-Tac Airport's water pollution permit, pushing for stronger environmental protections while the Port of Seattle seeks to weaken it. Their key concerns include toxic de-icing chemicals entering local streams, inadequate protection of Lake Reba, contaminated soil used in the third-runway construction, and years of delayed compliance with clean-water standards. The groups argue the permit fails to meet legally required industrial pollution controls and undermines previous rulings by the Pollution Control Hearings Board.

This map from King County's Department of Natural Resources and Parks illustrates the jurisdictional boundaries of the Miller/Walker Creek and Salmon Creek drainage basins in the area surrounding Sea-Tac International Airport and King County International Airport. It identifies the municipalities involved—including Burien, SeaTac, Seattle, Tukwila, Normandy Park, Des Moines, and unincorporated King County—along with key sub-basins such as the Hermes Depression, SW 142nd St. Depression, and Puget Sound Drainage areas. The map serves as a reference for stormwater and land-use planning in a region where airport operations and urban development intersect with sensitive waterways and wetlands.

This document is an environmental evaluation prepared by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for a dredge-and-fill permit application submitted by the Port of Seattle (permit no. 1996-4-02325). It assesses the potential impacts of proposed discharge activities on aquatic ecosystems, including effects on water quality, fish and wildlife, wetlands, and human uses such as fisheries and recreation. The evaluation also examines practicable alternatives and outlines measures to minimize or compensate for unavoidable environmental impacts.

This report challenges a 1995 environmental impact study that recommended building a third runway at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to handle bad-weather flight delays. It argues that poor weather actually restricts the airport to single-runway operations only about 17% of the year—not the 44% claimed in the official study—and that installing an LDA/DME instrument approach system to Runway 16R would be a sufficient and less disruptive alternative. The analysis draws on detailed hourly weather data from 1993 and 1994 to support the conclusion that a costly new runway is unnecessary.

The Regional Commission on Airport Affairs (RCAA) submitted formal scoping comments on the proposed Sea-Tac Airport Master Plan Update, which includes the addition of a third runway, calling for the Environmental Impact Statement to comply fully with both federal NEPA and state SEPA requirements. The RCAA emphasized that the EIS must be a comprehensive, nonpartisan document that is accessible to ordinary citizens and public officials, complete with proper citations, consistent terminology, indexed appendices, and clearly sourced maps and data. The comments also urged that all environmental impacts be analyzed across multiple time horizons, including the full useful life of the proposed runway, and that all study documents be made freely available to the public throughout King and Pierce Counties.

This U.S. Army Corps of Engineers permit (No. 1996-4-02325) authorized the Port of Seattle to construct a third runway at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, allowing permanent impacts to nearly 20 acres of wetlands and the filling or relocation of up to 980 linear feet of Miller Creek. The permit required the Port to implement a detailed Natural Resource Mitigation Plan, including wetland restoration projects at multiple sites such as Auburn, Vacca Farm, and Tyee Valley Golf Course, monitored over a 15-year period. Additional conditions mandated stormwater quality controls, water toxicity testing, and regular compliance reporting to the Corps of Engineers.

Initial Assessment and Recommendations February 1997 Prepared Under a Grant from the State of Washington administered by Washington State’s Department of Community, Trade and Economic Development for the: City of Burien, Washington City of Des Moines, Washington City of Federal Way, Washington City of Normandy Park, Washington Highline School District Highline Community Hospital Prepared by: