NYCAR JFK & LGA Committee gathers
for important topic updates
Noise, pollutants, health and FAA Next-Gen are important issues
AIRPORT VOICE, FEBRUARY 2020 33
This quarterly meeting
of the entire New York Community
Aviation Roundtable
( NYCAR) was held in the
Queens Boro President’s office
with participation of Acting
Boro President Sharon
Lee who encourage people to
out and vote for a new Boro
President in the special election
March 24.Being as there
was no quorum actual minutes
were provisional until
approved by a quorum of committee
members.
Chaired by Warren Schneider
( LaGuardia Committee(
and Barbara Brown ( JFK
Committee). Many of the topics
were updates on questions
from the December meeting.
Some of the reports were
quite detailed and scientific.
Neelakshi Hudda discussed
his research. Some of his findings
are early in their results
but generally he made the following
observations: on noise,
aviation emissions, climate
change impact, led and pother
pollutants that affect the surrounding
areas of the airports
and the health of these populations.
He reported that exposure
to elevated noise from
aircraft, has been associated
wit increased hypertension,
cardiovascular disease and
learning outcomes in children.
The FAA recognizes
health impacts in the 65 DNL
zone.
He said that exposure to elevated
levels of air pollution
from aircraft is understudied.
His research is focused on air
pollution impact.
The air pollutants he studied
are untrafine particles,
tracer or jet-exhaust emissions.
The particles are very
small and get deep into the
lungs and can cross bloodbrain
and other organs as well
as the central nervous system.
He cited findings from Los Angeles
Airport that the area
downwind of the runways had
the most impact from pollutants
and ;generally higher
NOx concentrations than EPA
sites studied closer to highways
with car exhaust.
He said his date clearly
shows that in the vicinity of
airports exposure to pollutants
UFPs and NOx are as
bad as being next to the highway.
The solution to mitigate
is to have a filtration system.
He suggested that Central air
conditioning would be useful.
This statement elicited a question
whether federal funds
should be available to those if
they are close to an airport or
highway for health reasons.
Hudda said that even a small
HEPA filter for a few hundred
dollars running a few hours
would reduce concentration
by 50%. One community member
asked if Part 150 take into
consideration air pollution. It
does not according to chairperson
Brown.
Tae Hong Park, Ph.D reported
on state-of-the-art AI
and Sensor networks for automatic
airplane noise detection
and tracking. He discussed
his NOISY system which captures
airplane noise event
tracking, dBA, date and time
of event, airplane type and airline,
speed of aircraft.
His overview included the
overall noise from aviation
in urban areas, the nature
of noise, and cardiovascular
complications, productivity,
impact on childrens’ learning,
sleep depravation and property
devaluation. He said to
fully gauge the impact good
measurement at the source
and constant measuring is
important. The equipment he
mentioned is transitioning
from the lab to the real world
using plug and play sensor
network, low-bandwidth data,
accessible window, home wifi.
The Artificial intelligence (AI)
allows automatic airplane detection
filtering out other sate.
A community member asked
about ownership of the home
data. Park said that this ha yet
to be determined as to how the
FAA would receive it, and how
it would be measured to draw
a detailed sound map. He also
said that FAA has monitors
that cost about $25,000whiloe
his is about $250. When asked
how many people it would take
to participate to make the data
usable Park said with Next-
Gen flight patterns only a narrow
band of sensors about every
700-1500 feet apart would
be sufficient. Chairperson
Brown said that the Eastern
Queens Alliance has a small
grant to look at air and noise
pollution and may be some
funding for a small citizen
project. She personally has
one of the Noisy systems and
is impressed with the data.
FAA Northeast corridor
(NEC) Project updates with
Mark Hopkins, Robert Novia
and Port Ralph Tamburro.
The Next Gen Advisory
Committee (NAC) began 3 year
ago to give the FAA advise on
how to implement Next-Gen.
NEC goals and objectives are
to improve the traveler experience
through better execution
of today’s operation, by enhanced
airport and airspace
throughput in all weather
conditions, noise mitigation
and reduced emissions. These
would be achieved through
the NEC scope of building
and improving actual airport
infrastructure, design and
evaluate operational procedures
with a goal to de conflict
traffic between airports in
close proximity, maximize already
deployed tools, improve
traffic into and output of the
NEC during periods of high
demand and sever weather,
deploy automation decision
support tools, process that enhance
information propagation
and decisions making. It
was reported that there have
been 100 total milestones in
these 4 areas and 10 FAA milestones
for CV2020.Some milestones
are concept assessments
for feasibility studies
that may lead to implementation
and can come from the industry
and airports as well as
from the FAA.
There are flight path
changes for 2020:
1. NTHNS/GLDMN
Departures
a) Proposed aircraft
procedure amendment would
enhance safety and efficiency
over the current procedure design
b) Aircraft shift west of
downtown Flushing and traverse
more directly over the
Van Wyck Expressway
c) This is not intended
to benefit the industry, it’s
purely for noise mitigation
d) Environmental review
ongoing
e) Procedure amendment
anticipated publication
date May 21, 2020
f) Path is being shifted
west by about 1,700 feet to the
west, can’t move much more
than that. This will be at low
altitudes.
g) This change came
out of the Part 150 study, it was
a community recommendation,
we pulled it into the NAC
because we believed we could
implement it faster than Part
150.
h) Sat nav can help concentrate
the track over a less
impactful area
i) There are some other
changes that may impact some
communities further out from
the airport
2. S at e l l i t e -Ba s e d
Route structure Offshore Airspace
East of NY
a) Redesign airspace
and route structure in offshore
airspace east of NY
b) Expected outcomes:
increase offshore airspace capacity
via additional sector
and segregation of flows in
tight airspace between Warning
Areas
c) We made a change
that allows us to get a lot more
aircraft through this area.
d) We’ve seen a dramatic
decrease in holding on
the ground, which helps reduce
emissions at the airports
3. East Coast Satellite-
Based (PBN) High-Altitude
Routes
a) Initial objective:
design high-altitude (above
24,000 feet) PBN route structure
to segregate flows and
better manage traffic to/from
major airports on the East
Coast
b) NEC: implementation
in Mid-Atlantic to New
England, mid-September 2020
c) Florida Metroplex:
Southern States to Puerto
Rico, implemented November
2020
d) More tight packing
of parallel routes above 24,000
feet
e) Main impact is on reducing
delays, not necessarily
noise because of the altitude
Barbara Brown, Co-Chair NYCAR, at a recent meeting.
FAA Andrew Brooks talks Part 161 with NYCAR.