THE BATTLE FOR WEST 30TH
we can and cannot do to mitigate our impact on the local community.” For example, helicopters on local flights in the Hudson River VFR corridor may fly no higher than 1,000 ft. and must maintain a speed of less than 140 kt. and fly in des- ignated north- and southbound “lanes” over the river. In addi- tion, complaints coming into the 311 hotline, New York City’s all-purpose government service center, show a high number of sound complaints stem from a small number of residents.
Airspace Access under Threat Nevertheless, in certain circles, attacking helicopters is good politics, and both local and state officials have used that tactic. In 2022, the state legislature passed a bill that would allow the state attorney general and individual citizens to sue helicopter operators who created “an unreasonable level of sustained noise on the ground” and would amend the Hudson River Park Act to ban from KJRA “nonessential” helicopter traffic—defined as anything unrelated to public safety, construction, research, or news-gathering. Concurrently, the New York City Council introduced leg-
islation to ban similarly “nonessential” flights from the two other government-owned heliports in the city, Downtown Manhattan/Wall Street Heliport (KJRB) and East 34th Street Heliport (6N5). Fresh versions of that legislation remain pending, as does a proposed helicopter sound tax, but the ability of those bills to affect the amount of sound from helicopter operations is highly questionable, according
32 POWER UP SEP 2024
to an analysis by the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC). Despite an alleged 17-fold increase in 311 complaints about
helicopter sound over the past five years, only 4% of those flights originated at those two heliports, according to the NYCEDC. (There also seems to be a correlation between a rapid increase in 311 complaints and pending antihelicopter legislation dating to at least 2015.) New York Gov. Kathy Hochul vetoed the state legisla-
tion in December 2022 on the grounds of its questionable legality, noting, “Recent federal case law makes clear that nonfederal actors must carefully consider how state and local restrictions interact with federal laws governing avia- tion. … Certain elements of this legislation run counter to the federal scheme regulating New York’s airports and airspace.” It is highly likely any city- enacted ban would similarly run
afoul of the legal principle of federal preemption, which gives the federal government sole authority to regulate aviation. Even if the ban survived a legal challenge, however, it likely wouldn’t make an impact on sound levels in the city. A recent analysis published by the nonprofit newsroom Gothamist shows that two-thirds of the helicopter sound over the city is from flights that originate in New Jersey or the Hamptons. While 13% of the flights analyzed did originate at KJRA, the city ban would extend only to the two heliports it owns, not to KJRA, which is controlled by the Hudson River Park Trust. But the diffuse origin of flights underscores a point
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