Land Use Strategies for Aircraft Noise Alleviation

The need to reduce airport-community problems will present a major challenge in the quest for environmental improvement. Federal policy to use all practical means and measures to preserve and enhance the environment is evident with the Environmental Policy Act of 1969, and a new focus on the quality of living in the Nation's urban areas is seen in the environmental and planning preconditions to the assistance of airport development projects under the Airport and Airway Development Act of 1970. In order to minimize any adverse impact of airport development, we need to bring land use strategies - land use planning and land use controls - to bear on the achievement of solutions to conflict between airports and other land uses that will protect both the airport and incompatible land uses from encroachment by each other. Land use strategies must be used in combination with programs to reduce noise through source control and flight procedures to minimize noise exposed areas. Metropolitan Aircraft Noise Abatement Policy Studies are being conducted by HUD and DOT to demonstrate a variety of techniques for planning an overall development policy in specific airport locations. It is evident from these studies that there are preventive as well as remedial measures that can be taken to achieve land use compatibility, and that the potential for land use strategies is strengthened by an inter-community approach which considers planning, land use controls, and development policy options which are in harmony with the goals of the airport and the community in which it is located.