File complaints now
We know how frustrating and disturbing it is to family life to have to drop everything to call in a noise complaint or jot down complaints to file later. The Town of East Hampton must recognize that it is unreasonable:
- to expect those who bear the brunt of noise and pollution from KHTO operations to bear the additional burden of having to file noise complaints!
- to continue to request we file noise complaints year after year when the town has access to years of complaint data.
- to continue to request we file noise complaints when there is little action taken to address our complaints and no discernible reduction in noise.
Complaint fatigue is real. The Town of East Hampton must recognize that every operation at KHTO is a real noise and air pollution event.
That said, we know recent complaint data is important to politicians; many decisions are made based on the numbers of residents complaining on a particular issue, and it's the squeaky wheel that gets the grease. Without noise complaints, East Hampton Town will continue to insist that there are only a few chronic noise complainers and thereby provide politicians with the excuse they need to continue to do nothing.
Place noise complaints to the Town of East Hampton by phone, email or online using any of the following four options:
Tel: 1-800-376-4817
Email: HTO@planenoise.com
Online: www.planenoise.com/khto/
Online (see screen image from Vector site below):
https://airport.vector-us.com/Public/PublicPortal.aspx?airportCode=KHTO
The site tracks flights, but does not accept noise complaints.
3. http://flightaware.com/live/airport/KHTO
The site tracks flights, but does not accept noise complaints.
There are three flight tracking sites we refer to frequently and which you can try:
1. Airnoisereport.com Our favorite easy to use site for noise complaints
This user-friendly real time noise complaint site tracks helicopter and small planes and can easily be downloaded to mobile devices; instructions are provided on the site. Unfortunately, the Town of East Hampton is now accepting data from complaints filed on this non-profit site, and the data is provided to the town free of charge. As of end November, 2016, over 36,000 complaints had been filed for the year on this site. Air Noise Report is the only noise complaint site operated independently, free of charge to the community, and not controlled by those with aviation interests.
https://airnoisereport.com/complaints/new
Write your elected representatives, ask them to accept data on noise complaints in your area from airnoisereport.com (to see which elected officials are already accepting this data, go to https://airnoisereport.com/partners
Screenshots shown below are from AirNoiseReport.com, and illustrate just how badly the FAA's North and South Shore Routes are, at a given time, impacting residential communities far north and west of East Hampton Airport.
Images were taken in July and August 2016. It is easy enough to track these aircraft from departure to arrival at destination, that's how we learned they are headed to or from KHTO, East Hampton Airport.
The aviation industry is intensely lobbying to change the technology these websites rely on to track flights; and/or to criminalize the public dissemination of the data. If that happens, websites like this will need to shut down.