PASCACK VALLEY—A regional citizens group formed to help minimize jet aircraft flight volumes and noise over the Pascack Valley kicked off efforts in June by posing a half-dozen questions to top Federal Aviation Administration officials over why an alternate landing route over Route 17 remains underused — and why jet traffic is concentrated over certain Pascack Valley towns.
Taxpayers For Aircraft Noise Solutions, or TANS, consists of nearly 40 individuals, most from the 10 towns in the greater Pascack Valley. The group hopes to find workable solutions to increasing amounts of jet aircraft noise that adversely affect the quality of life in the Pascack Valley and environs.
“We need the Federal Aviation Administration’s help to see that this alternate route is used more in the evening and during the daytime hours as well,” said TANS in a mid-June letter to Marie Kennington-Gardiner, FAA Eastern Region administrator.
TANS has support from the Pascack Valley Mayors Association, which meets monthly on regional issues. TANS is powered by local activists who organized after meeting at the Teterboro Aircraft Noise Abatement Advisory Committee (TANAAC), which was established on Feb. 26, 1987
In its letter, TANS presses FAA officials over too-little use of the alternate landing path.
“Several years ago, prior to Covid, the FAA developed, accepted, and endorsed the Route 17 alternate route as a desirable choice for arrivals to Runway 19 at Teterboro Airport. This RNAV-GPS X approach to Runway 19 avoids our area and it also provides relief to TANAAC member towns like Hackensack with very little negative impact on any residential neighborhoods in Bergen County. This FAA-developed alternate approach was based on many years of diligent study by teams of Federal air traffic control professionals, wrote TANS.
It said, “When the route was presented by the FAA to the TANAAC Committee, Bergen County residents had a reasonable expectation that this path to Runway 19 would ease the unreasonably high burden placed on residents for years due to the volume of jets flying into Teterboro Airport. We realize much thought went into the FAA’s decision to develop the RNAV-GPS X approach and we would hope the same amount of thought be directed to the use of this route, and not just at night after 10 p.m., but certainly during the day and especially on the weekends.
TANS added, “It is even more critical in the summer, when the burden is greatest, frequently arising from the continuing return of weekenders from places like Martha’s Vineyard on Sunday afternoons.”.
The group asked:
- Why are the FAA air traffic controllers not directing more traffic to the RNAV-GPS X Runway 19 alternate route? Are these controllers managing the air traffic from TRACON on Long Island?
- In good weather, why not reasonably divide the arrivals between the ILS approach, the RNAV-GPS X approach, and the other runways into Teterboro Airport?
- Why can’t the FAA make the RNAV-GPS X route be the preferred route on Saturdays and on Sunday mornings? (this is when the volume of arrivals via Runway 19 is at its low point).
- Based on [an] attached map, can any reasonably astute aviation professional seriously suggest that this concentration is appropriate? Newark Airport has slot controls in place that do not allow more than 79 arrivals/departures each hour. Teterboro approaches that number periodically and is smaller. Why not establish a maximum number per hour for Teterboro?
- Please compare the present flight map with a pro forma flight map with RNAV-GPS X Runway 19 approach carrying a more significant quantity of arrivals. Please share this comparison with us via email.
- Does Essex County Airport prevent increased use of the RNAV-GPS X Runway 19 alternate approach? If it does, please explain how, and why changes there are not being addressed to allow relief to the residents of the Pascack Valley and surrounding towns.
Audrey Herget, Park Ridge’s TANS representative and group founder, said the group wants to “work for the good of everyone in this area.”
She said that TANS wants to work with the FAA, Teterboro Airport, and Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and “be reasonable about this. It’s a complicated issue but people are just coming out of the woodwork to join this group.”
No responses to its letter have yet been received, Herget said.
She said through TANS, “We’re starting to organize and create a voice. Our letters will be thoroughly thought out…We’re not asking for pie-in-the-sky solutions.”
Hillsdale Mayor John Ruocco addressed similar concerns via a mid-June mayor’s message. He said in part, “I have received a considerable number of complaints over several years from Hillsdale residents regarding the noise level created by planes as they approach Teterboro Airport. I and other mayors from the Pascack Valley have been making efforts to enact changes in flight paths over our towns, directing them mostly to officials of the Federal Aviation Authority, the Port Authority of NY and NJ, and Teterboro Airport.”
He added, “We have reached a point where any success will be heavily influenced by the collective weight of informed public opinion and regionally organized efforts to influence policy makers in a manner that neither compromises air traffic safety nor sacrifices the ability of residents to achieve a lower level of noise disruption.”
Ruocco encouraged residents concerned about aircraft noise to volunteer with TANS.
Late last year, the Pascack Valley Mayors Association requested a seat on the TANAAC (Teterboro Aircraft Noise Abatement Advisory Committee) board, which is comprised of towns within five miles of Teterboro Airport, to voice concerns about noise and flight patterns.
However, TANAAC’s 15 member towns rejected the mayors’ request, noting Pascack Valley towns were outside the five-mile airport radius, and said making an exception for Pascack Valley would open the door to other communities.
Recently, Woodcliff Lake Mayor Carlos Rendo told Pascack Press that jet flights over the borough appear to increase on weekends, disrupting outdoor events.
PVMA’s support of TANS
In a June 28 letter to the FAA’s eastern region administrator, the 10-town mayors’ association wrote, “We fully endorse TANS (Taxpayers for Aircraft Noise Solutions) efforts to understand why FAA traffic controllers are not directing more flights approaching Runway 19 to the RNAV – GPX-S ‘alternate’ route, especially during the more troublesome weekend and evening hours.”
They said, “We appreciate the utilization of this alternate route has increased from 3% (when PVMA members sat in on a Zoom conference with Teterboro administrators in February 2022) to 10% now. However, the increased volume of flights depreciates that gain.”
They said, “In February 2022, the PVMA formally requested a seat on TANAAC. We were rebuffed. The grassroots TANS group has been steadily gaining members. Some of our towns have already assigned council members who will liaise and report back to their governing bodies on progress, or lack thereof, on these issues.”
And they said, “The group has set out a series of reasonable threshold questions that deserve answers.”
How TANS evolved
Herget said the TANS group evolved from participants at the TANAAC meetings who joined together. Initially, these included Warren Feldman of Woodcliff Lake and Mary Ellen Stickel of the Township of Washington.
“I developed the TANS mission, our short and long term objectives, organized initial tasks and responsibilities, and committed to an overall plan to bring some of the best minds in management, government planning and aviation to the task of addressing this longstanding and intractable problem,” Herget told Pascack Press.
Herget said the goal is to get each town to appoint a liaison to their council and representative on the TANS committee.
For more information on TANS, including how to get involved, write Herget at tanspvnj@gmail.com.