Jul 3, 2018 1:06 PM

The Federal Aviation Administration has offered few encouraging signs that it might allow East Hampton Town to restrict the number of flights into East Hampton Airport, town officials say.

Members of the Town Board and consultants for the town have been wrestling with how to propose limits at the airport that would reduce the overall number of flights, particularly by helicopters, that the FAA will approve. After meeting recently with representatives and attorneys from the federal agency, though, board members said the FAA gave them no guidance on what tack they might take with any hope of success.

“We want to keep the airport in operation in a way it can sustain itself but at the same time limit the number of operations, and we don’t quite have our arms around that yet,” Councilwoman Sylvia Overby told members of the town’s Airport Management Advisory Committee last month. “And it’s not just striking that balance—we have to have a partner in the FAA. And, so far, they have been less than helpful.”

The town plans to file a so-called Part 161 application later this year, starting a process that could take years and millions of dollars to complete. How exactly to approach the application is murky, because no municipality has ever asked the FAA for the sort of general flight restrictions on private aircraft that the town is seeking.

Ms. Overby and Councilman Jeff Bragman are the Town Board liaisons to the airport and are tasked with crafting the regulations the town will ask the FAA for permission to impose. The town is expected to ask the FAA to reinstate overnight curfews like those the town had adopted in 2015, only to have them removed by a federal appeals court after two seasons.

But the town has said that it also hopes to find a way to reduce overall air traffic to ease the noise impacts on residents of several communities on the North and South Forks that are under flight paths.

In April, the town’s attorney for the Part 161 application, Bill O’Connor, had offered several suggestions for possible approaches, including quotas on certain operators, or fixed landing and takeoff times that could be tailored to reduce traffic volume.

If noise impacts are not reduced, board members have surmised, sentiment in the community may someday turn to closing down the airport.

The Part 161 application and the future of the airport are at the heart of a split between the Town Board and the Airport Management Advisory Committee over whether the town should pay to have a dedicated taxiway built along the full length of the airport’s main runway.

The committee, which includes some staunch critics of the airport’s impact on surrounding neighborhoods, has recommended that the taxiway be built. The Town Board approved bonding $2.1 million in January to do the taxiway project—over Ms. Overby’s objections—but has not advanced the project since then.

At the recent meeting, Ms. Overby said the hesitation on the part of the board is out of concern about “sending the wrong message” to the FAA about the town’s plans for the airport.

“This is something we are discussing with our outside counsel, and we are listening to what they say,” she said. “They are looking at it as a whole process, and how that sends signals as to what the intention of the Part 161 is going to be.”

Committee members challenged her on whether the town was taking an approach that would only make emergency fixes.

“Are we only spending money on catastrophe situations?” the committee’s chairman, Arthur Malman, asked. “Is it that, except for safety situations, you don’t want to spend money on an airport that could be closed?”

Ms. Overby said that was not the case and pointed to the more than $1 million the town had spent on upgrading the airport’s fuel supply depot this year. She denied that the Town Board has made any decision about closing the airport if the Part 161 is unsuccessful at reining in aircraft noise.

“I don’t think we’ve reached that conclusion in such a stark way,” she said. “The Town Board as a whole wants the airport to be a general aviation airport … that doesn’t negatively impact people’s lives. That’s not easy to achieve with 20,000-plus operations [flights per year].”

Committee members pressed their position that completing the taxiway would have no impact on the volume of traffic at the airport and would still be needed if the town is successful in reducing the number of flights at the airport.

“A full parallel taxiway is appropriate for any outcome for the airport, other than closing it,” said David Gruber, who committee members made a point of noting over the winter had essentially never agreed with the aviation industry representatives on the committee until the taxiway project came up. “There is nothing inconsistent with a full taxiway, assuming there is an airport at all.”

Mr. Bragman reiterated that the attorneys had been the ones to hit the pause button, looking ahead to the FAA rather than management of the airport.

“We are not picking this apart in pieces,” he said. “We’re following the attorney’s suggestions.”