Revere: Unlike its planes, D-M mostly quiet on noise answers

For such a hot-button issue, a forum on Air Force flights over midtown Tucson sure does make for mind-numbing theater.

If you were to let your imagination wander just a bit during Wednesday's long-awaited Military Community Compatibility Committee hearing, you could almost hear actor Ben Stein's monotone voice saying, "Bueller ... Bueller ... Bueller." For many in attendance at Santa Rita High School's cafeteria, the experience was about that deep.

The so-called MC3 was formed to address issues that Tucsonans living beneath the military flights felt were overlooked when the city and state approved a land-use plan designed to keep Davis-Monthan off the Pentagon base closure lists.

About 50 people heard the panel's ideas for how D-M might reduce its impact - primarily noise - on central Tucson.

It didn't go over well.

"They're talking about things to manipulate the decibel level, but they're not talking about frequency of flights," lamented Karen Martin, a resident of the Broadmoor/Broadway Village Neighborhood and member of a grass-roots group called "Tucsonans for Sound Solutions."

Arlan Colton, Pima County's chief planner and a member of the MC3, described a host of adjustments D-M might consider to make life in midtown a bit quieter. Key among those were:

● Increasing the altitude of aircraft passing over the city and asking pilots to "land long" - touching down farther up the runway.

● Rerouting approach patterns above the Union Pacific Railroad tracks rather than over neighborhoods.

● Having pilots conduct their training approaches over other air bases, including Fort Huachuca's Libby Field and the Marine Air Station in Yuma.

These suggestions were more fleshy than I expected.

It's not too realistic to expect the Air Force to close shop in a town where it has six decades of seniority and the nation's premier bombing range just a short flight to the west.

Being Martin's neighbor, though, I understand her desire for relief.

"We have as many as 27 flights an hour over our neighborhood," Martin notes. "That adds up to about 13 minutes out of every hour of elevated jet noise."

That sounds about right on a bad day.

Lots of Tucsonans share the opinion that we midtowners are a bunch of whiners who need to be told that what we're hearing is "the sound of freedom."

I'm sure I speak for a great many who cherish their lot as Americans when I say that we'd like to be free of that tired refrain.

Tucsonans living in neighborhoods like Sam Hughes, Colonia Solana, Arroyo Chico and others beneath the flight paths deal with noise levels and questions about its health effects that people in other parts of town don't. None of these neighborhoods are johnny-come-lately developments. All were established before the city began to crowd the base and threaten its existence.

Lisa McFarlane learned this after buying her home in the Arroyo Chico neighborhood in 2003.

"I've lived in central Tucson for 20 years and I never really noticed the jets before. But I sure notice them now," she said. "I've had decibel readings of 90 decibels inside my house with the windows and doors closed. It just really wears on you."

Col. Scott Hines, inspector-general for the 355th Wing at D-M, said base officials will consider all the MC3 recommendations.

But he stops short of promising any changes.

"It's not an easy issue. None of it is," he said. "It's a cost-benefit analysis. What is the benefit to the community and what is our side of making the change? Can I land longer? Yes. But what's the cost of that and what's the benefit to the city?"

He estimates the proposed changes could reduce the noise by two or three decibels.

"You or I wouldn't notice it unless it reached about 10 decibels," Hines said.

The anticipated difference would probably be about enough to make Broadmoor sound like Sam Hughes and Arroyo Chico to sound like Broadmoor.

Not much to get excited about there.