City Council Looks at Helicopter Restrictions; Community to Rally
Years of community organizing to scale back the frequency of helicopter flights over Lower Manhattan (and the entire region) may be approaching an inflection point. The City Council now has before it a package of three bills and three resolutions that, if enacted, would dramatically curtail access to local skies for whirlybirds.
“We hear complaints every day from residents around the metropolitan area,” says Melissa Elstein, board chair of Stop the Chop NY/NJ, a grassroots organization that advocates for reducing non-essential chopper flights. “People tell us the noise from helicopters means they can’t use parks, they are disturbed in their homes, and that their children can’t sleep. Air space and air quality and the quiet enjoyment of outdoors are public assets. But the public has never been given a say when the decision is made to monetize publics assets to enrich private interests. The public has never been asked whether they are comfortable with this volume of low-lying traffic.”
Ms. Elstein adds that the publicly owned Downtown Manhattan Heliport—located on the East River waterfront at Pier 6, near the intersection of Coenties Slip and South Street—is authorized to host 30,000 tourist flights annually, or more than 80 per day.
“This is madness,” she says, adding that the City realizes only about $2 million in revenue from this agreement, even through each flight can hold up to four passengers paying several hundred dollars apiece.
The measures now before the City Council include three proposed laws. The first would ban from City-owned heliports all flights other than those deemed essential (defined as any sortie other than those operated by the military, law enforcement, fire personnel, air ambulances, and news organizations, plus emergency landings). The second would make an exception for electric-powered helicopters, which appear poised to become the next generation of rotary-wing aircraft. And the third would mandate noise monitoring for any area of New York experiencing helicopter nose.
Also included in the package are three resolutions, which are advisory measures in which the City Council calls upon other arms of government to take action in areas where the municipal legislature lacks direct jurisdiction. One urges the State legislature to enact a “noise tax” on non-essential helicopter flights anywhere in the City. Another asks Albany to amend the Hudson River Park Act to ban non-essential flights at the West 30th Street heliport (which falls under State, rather than City oversight). And the third requests that the federal government ban non-essential helicopter travel over New York City, regardless of where those flights take off or land.
City Council member Christopher Marte, who is a sponsor or co-sponsor on each of these bills and resolutions, says, “the noise pollution helicopters cause is inescapable and endless in Lower Manhattan. This package of legislation takes a comprehensive approach—tackling the issue at the City level and extending pressure to the State and Federal governments, who have greater jurisdiction.”
The Council will hold a public hearing to consider these bills and resolutions tomorrow (Tuesday, April 16), starting at 10am, on the 16th floor of 250 Broadway. Interested members of the public are invited to attend and testify in person or via Zoom. Click here for information about attending or testifying.
Prior to the hearing, there will be a 9am rally in City Hall Park, hosted by City Council Majority Leader Amanda Farías and Stop the Chop/NY-NJ, to build support and raise awareness.
“We have the support of the Majority Leader,” says Ms. Elstein, “and we’re getting a hearing at the City Council, which hasn’t happened before. We are building a broader coalition, and harnessing a groundswell of support.”