Why so many flights fly over Westchester homes

Residents frequently contact me asking why so many planes fly over their homes. I reached out to the county airport officials and received an excellent explanation.

The New York metro area has the busiest airspace in the world. On a typical day more than 5,000 aircraft will arrive, depart or just pass through New York's airspace. Westchester County Airport typically accounts for about 10% of this traffic.

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The county airport is a public use facility. Like a highway, the airport is open to all users whose aircraft can be operated within the physical limitations of the airfield. The county may not discriminate against users based on aircraft type (general aviation vs. commercial aviation). Doing so would violate the grant assurance agreements between the county and the Federal Aviation Administration related to federal funds that have paid for improvements at the airport.

Westchester County Airport is open 24 hours a day. Under the federal Airport Noise and Capacity Act of 1990 (ANCA) any airport that did not have a hard restriction such as a curfew in place prior to October of 1990 cannot implement one. Even if ANCA or the grant assurance agreements were not in place, Westchester County is under a permanent injunction forbidding the county from implementing or enforcing any form of restriction on the operations at the airport. (United States v. County Of Westchester, 571 F. Supp. 786 (S.D.N.Y 1983)

While the airport has a Voluntary Restraint from Flying period from Midnight to 6:30 AM, the airport can only ask operators to avoid flying during that time and can take no action against those that do.

We have received your input and will keep record of your inquiry.

Kindly refer to the noise abatement website with further questions and concerns:
airport.westchestergov.com/about-us/environmental-management-system/noise-abatement

Direct link to file a formal complaint : viewpoint.emsbk.com/hpn3

PAUL FEINER
Greenburgh Town Supervisor