PORTLAND, Maine (NEWS CENTER) --
The Portland Jetport announced a change to its flight patterns due to construction on an area near the runway in order to accommodate more passengers.
Assistant Airport Director Zach Sundquist said a construction project will change an area called an apron from asphalt to concrete in order to handle bigger, heavier planes.
Normally, planes at the Jetport depart from the west, and land from the west. The location of the construction would force pilots to have to "back taxi," sending the airplane in the opposite direction on the runway. Sundquist said, in this case, "back taxiing would" not be safe.
Instead, the planes will depart from the east and land from the east, which means planes will fly over Portland, South Portland, Scarborough, and Cape Elizabeth during the peak times: 5:30 a.m. to 7 a.m. and 10 p.m. to 12:30 p.m. Sundquist said roughly 40 to 45 planes depart and arrive during those hours.
The change is only temporary: it begins on May 15 and ends on June 6.
“We are reaching out to all of our neighbors to ensure they are made aware of a change in our flight pattern due to a construction project on the airfield” stated Paul Bradbury, Airport Director. “We recognize that this project will impact a number of residents who don’t normally experience aircraft taking off or landing over their homes in the early morning or late evening.”
People who live in the affected neighborhoods say they will put up with the temporary headache.
"We are up at 5, so it's not going to be bad, but I don't know about the 10 o'clock at night ones," said Nancy Lupien.
The Jetport has had a standing Noise Advisory Committee which has been actively engaged over the past decade in reducing noise exposure to its neighbors. Over the past decade preferred approaches have been created that keep aircraft over less populated areas. Additional changes have included the daytime implementation of the “Harbor Visual Approach” which keeps airplanes over the harbor and Fore River on approach, and the RNAV departure which keeps departing aircraft over the water.
“Our goal is to be a good neighbor, and good neighbors give advanced notice of an inconvenience. We’re really excited about the construction project that will help us improve our capabilities for servicing our airlines’ fleet mix, but are very cognizant that this construction project will have an impact on our surrounding community for three weeks” said Bradbury.
Since 2008 passenger traffic has continued to increase to over 1.78 million in 2016. At the same time the number of aircraft that have flown in and out of Portland has decreased by over 30%. As airlines continue to operate larger aircraft, they are able to accommodate more passengers with fewer overall operations.
Residents inconvenienced by aircraft noise are invited to submit a noise complaint on the Jetport’s Noise Abatement Program website at www.portlandjetport.org/noise