2000-10-16 Special Called Workshop Meeting

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e e 10-16-00 Council presentation notes. 1. Mr. Guttery of the Texas Airports Development Office has stated that ,". ..our Advisory Circular on Airport Design does not preclude roads from being in RPZs". Let's see what the Design Standards say. Page 13 yields the only information in the Design Standards regarding vehicles in an RPZ. Sec.212(2)(a) states," Automobile parking facilities although discouraged, may be permitted, provided the parking facilities and any associated appurtenances, in addition to meeting all of the preceding conditions, are located outside of the object free area extension(as depicted in fig. 2-3). Of course, it also stands on it's own that vehicles and people are objects per the page 2 definition and are not navigational aids and are therefore required to be cleared from the Object Free Area extension. And of course this is located under standards and not under recommendations and is therefore mandatory for this RPZ because La Porte used a Federal grant to buy the RPZ. About 700 ft. of the proposed Phase 1 Road would not meet the OF A extension c~earing requirements. When I talked with Jim Curl, the Tex DOT inspector for this Airport, on the subject of roads through an RPZ, I said,"I guess the upshot of all that is that you guys don't want roads within your RPZ", and he replied," or within the OFZ or RSA, any of the three". he also stated that "if we can purchase the old and get rid of it, we do that", but said that sometimes roads (existing before 1989) had to be grandfathered in because "highways are awfully expensive to move". I said, "but ifit is new stuff, you don't want them in there". He replied ,"That's right." Using the Design standards as we did above, We can just as easily prove that the Farrington extension would not comply with the requirements of the Instrument approach thresh hold or the Localizer antenna critical area that is supposed to be cleared of all objects. When I talked with Mr. Legeratta of the Washington D.C. FAA regarding RPZs, he stated, "I f you take the federal money we want you to make all the efforts to obtain the land". I think it is obvious the City did NOT "make all the efforts to obtain the land". He also said that," even if an Airport does not accept Federal dollars and looked at the book and says it is just a recommendation, when it comes to an accident, the Airport is kinda hanging out there... because the judges will say. Why aren't you taking the recommendations?" and La Porte is governed under the more strict "mandatory" view of the standards, not the recommended view. So with all these facts that prove that the Phase 1 Road should not be in the RPZ, Why is Mr. Guttery insisting it is O.K. Sadly, many of us have seen this sort of thing at work and in government many times. A bad decision is made and when it becomes apparent; the people that made the decision choose to stonewall and push the decision rather than take corrective action. Will the La Porte City Council be a part of taking the corrective action? Or will the City Council be part of pushing a very bad, very dangerous decision. 15J2idc~~ Bill Scott, Treasurer for CSG Thanks for your time and consideration,