The NextGen System
This is the FAA's slick report on the NextGen system. Efficiency for the airlines (shorter flights, more flights per day, higher profits), and no regard for the noise created by that gift to them.
Multiple NextGen concentrated converging routes lead to a loud din
Tandem arrivals at SFO are cause for much of the noise we hear.
Whispering along at 90+ DB.
The FAA promised increased safety, higher efficiency, less congestion. Reality turned out quite differently. Using Orwellian style nuspeak: safety meant fleet safety, not people safety; higher efficiency and fuel savings meant shorter flight times to permit higher profits by introducing more flights; less congestion meant less ground time but many more planes spaced closer together, and flying far lower over people's homes than ever before. The result: massive noise pollution.
Noise is not and never was a consideration with the FAA. They created a system in which the airspace above people's homes and properties, above municipal, state, and federal parks and wilderness areas are now saturated with multiple levels of overflights, many very low. Where once overflights never dipped below 20,000 feet, now there are flights stacked from 4000 to 15,000 feet. And, with closer 2-minute flight separation, it is common to have noisy overflights every 20-30 seconds creating a continuous din. Why? Pure profits - takings from private citizens to the airlines.
We were told by the airports and the FAA to complain, to manually file reports, one a time, where the reports are tallied, and forgotten. The only way to deal with the institutionalized frustration of the reporting system is through automation. Noise monitors record the overflights at various sites. The information is sent to a server which stores the data, performs analysis, and builds disturbance lists. You tell it approximately when you were disturbed and it returns to you a detailed list.
This is the FAA's slick report on the NextGen system. Efficiency for the airlines (shorter flights, more flights per day, higher profits), and no regard for the noise created by that gift to them.
This is a history of the Day Night average sound level (DNL), which the FAA uses as their model for noise thresholds. Things were different in the 60s and most of the studies were done in dense urban areas near airports.
Help us collect the data we need to fight the noise pollution. Join us by setting up networked noise loggers in your homes to get coverage throughout the nation.