Articles

Originally published in: Patch

Northern Virginia residents are now starting to notice higher noise levels from flight pattern changes approved by federal officials at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport without proper community engagement just before the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, U.S. Rep. Don Beyer (D-8th) said Wednesday.

In late January 2020, the Federal Aviation Administration, at the request of the U.S. Secret Service, shifted the departure route of airplanes from National Airport from the middle of the Potomac River to an area over Virginia.

Beyer, who represents the communities of Virginia around the airport, said in a letter sent Wednesday to the Secret Service and the FAA that the changes to flight patterns at the airport were put into place just before a major drop-off in flights caused by the pandemic. The impact of the flight pattern changes on noise levels in the region is starting to be felt in full for the first time now.

About half as many passengers used National Airport in 2020 compared to 2021, according to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority. "Air traffic has picked up significantly in the past year and my constituents are now bearing the burden of the procedural changes through increased and concentrated aircraft noise over their neighborhoods," Beyer said.

In the letter, Beyer, a member of the Congressional Quiet Skies Caucus, also noted the flight pattern changes at National Airport were implemented without an environmental review.

Community engagement and environmental reviews "are both crucial steps in the normal procedural change review process" for airport flight patterns, according to Beyer.

"In fact, the procedure in question had been previously proposed and rejected by the community because it concentrated air traffic over neighborhood and school in Maryland, Virginia, and DC," the congressman said.

Beyer wants an update on the Prohibited Area 56 National Security Project, which changed approach and departure procedures at National Airport at the request of the Secret Service in order to prevent possible incursions into restricted airspace by the White House, National Mall and Naval Observatory.

"While I understand the national security implications of these procedural changes, I remain concerned about the concentration of airplane noise it has caused in Northern Virginia and the process by which the changes were undertaken," Beyer said.

The congressman said the FAA, together the Secret Service, should halt the flight pattern changes until a "proper environmental review process is completed and the concerns of affected communities are taken into consideration."