Newport Beach OKs new equipment to monitor aircraft noise

The Newport Beach City Council took a step toward replacing the aging equipment that monitors aircraft noise emanating from John Wayne Airport with new technology.

The council voted unanimously Tuesday night to sign off on the replacement of 10 monitoring stations, three of which were placed in the arrival corridor and seven in the departure corridor near Newport Heights and the Back Bay.

The proposal ultimately will need county Board of Supervisors’ approval.

The current equipment is nearly 20 years old and should be replaced given the age of the technology and the fact that some of the components are no longer being made, according to city staff.

Each station is a tall pole-like structure with a microphone at the top to pick up the sound as planes fly over. The stations, which are set up in a triangle pattern, are intended to ensure that airlines are complying with noise thresholds put in place by a 1985 settlement agreement reached by the county, city, airport, Stop Polluting Our Newport — a community group dedicated to preserving the city’s residential atmosphere — and the airport working group.

The agreement also established a flight curfew, an annual passenger limit and a daily limit on the number of departures at the airport. In 2014, the parties agreed to extend the agreement through December 2030.

As part of approving the new sound monitoring stations, the council also agreed Tuesday night to increase the noise thresholds outlined in the settlement agreement to reflect the new system’s more sensitive microphones.

Data from tests of the new system during a three-month period in the JWA flight corridors show that the technology recorded noise from each flight at 0.3 to 0.9 decibels higher than the current system. The council feared that by not raising the threshold to accommodate the change in decibels, someone could argue that the agreement was in effect tightened, violating the Airport Noise the Capacity Act.

The act, passed by Congress in 1990, established a national aviation noise policy that prevents local airport operators from restricting the use of their airports because of noise concerns. Because John Wayne Airport and the city already had an established agreement, its noise parameters were grandfathered in. But, the council said, not changing the allowable decibels to coincide with the more sensitive equipment’s higher readings could be considered a de facto restriction.

The change in decibels doesn’t necessarily mean that residents would experience more noise, according to Thomas Edwards, the city counsel for airport affairs.

“The noise is what it is,” he said. “[The noise] is just being read with the new equipment and registered differently.”

Councilman Scott Peotter indicated that the technology might simply be more adequately measuring airport noise and questioned whether thresholds should be changed.

“We’re not making it more restrictive. We’re just measuring better,” he said.

Councilman Keith Curry said abiding by the Airport Noise and Capacity Act would protect the city from having the settlement agreement challenged in court.

“If we don’t do this, someone could go to court and try to invalidate the settlement agreement,” he said. “This is a way to protect our purview.”

SPON and the airport working group have signed off on the changes. The Orange County Board of Supervisors is expected to vote on the replacement within the next several weeks.