Westchester County Airport (KHPN), White Plains, New York

Trees return as Westchester airport issue

Several dozen trees in Greenwich are inching into airspace traversed by jets landing at Westchester County Airport, stirring what could be the start of another border battle between Connecticut tree-owners and the neighboring New York airport.

For Airport Manager Peter Scherrer, it's a case of deja vu.

In 1989, those same trees had grown tall enough to penetrate the airspace pilots then used when landing on the airport's alternate runway. The tree growth prompted federal regulators to mark the first 1,300 feet of the shorter of the airport's two landing strips off limits to pilots.

Now those same trees -- 25 years older and several inches taller -- are breaching the edge of the new flight path. Scherrer said he's already been warned by Federal Aviation Association officials that further tree growth could force additional shrinking of the runway.

For vacationers flying on US Airways, JetBlue or Delta, travel delays could increase if more of the small, corporate airplanes and flight school crafts that now use the alternate strip are forced to use the main runway because theirs has become too short.

That's something Scherrer said he would like to avoid. So he's setting out to resolve the airport's tree problem before the branches actually penetrate the threshold.

"It's my job to keep our runways," Scherrer said on a recent afternoon. "It's my job to keep people who use the runways safe. All we're really trying to do is be proactive and take a look at solutions. What can we do to save this runway for the future? We may never find a solution to the tree issue, but we're going to search for one."

Tree trimming or removal is an obvious option. But Scherrer said that's not a plan he's advocating.

That's because back in the early '90s, Westchester County waged a court battle against the town of Greenwich, the state of Connecticut and several landowners in an attempt to have about 50 trees chopped down so more aircraft could use the backup runway. The county offered to pay the cost to remove the trees, most of which are on land owned by Convent of the Sacred Heart, Fairview Health of Greenwich, the town of Greenwich and a King Street resident.

But a judge ruled that the county had no right to order the Greenwich property owners to chop or top off their trees.

Greenwich tree owners contacted by Greenwich Time this week either did not return requests for comment or declined to comment because they said they had not been notified of the new problem by any authority. Town officials did not return requests for comment.

Scherrer said one alternate solution he and other officials are studying involves realigning the alternate runway so that the trees are no longer anywhere near the flight path. The drawback to this idea, Sherrer said, is it's likely to be very expensive.

Scherrer said he's also considering a plan to install lights that help pilots land safely. The lights, called Precision Approach Path Indicators, are already installed on the main runway.

"If you're high on your landing, the lights appear white to you and if you're low, the lights appear red," Scherrer explained. "When you're spot on, you see two red and two white lights.

"At night, it almost looks like you're landing in a hole because it's so dark, so you want to get as many indicators as possible to make sure the pilot has a sense of where the trees are, where the runway is and so that the landing is safe."

The lights wouldn't solve the tree problem so much as buy time, Scherrer said.

The trees are not currently a safety issue for pilots and airline passengers, he said, but could become one with continued growth.

An FAA spokesman said the agency monitors the tree growth annually and has not found any present safety issues.

All told, the alternate runway is 4,450 feet long, with 1,300 feet marked out-of-bounds due to the trees and an additional 300 feet of usable length on the chopping block next year in order to satisfy a federal safety zone requirement.

If additional tree growth prompts the FAA to cut even more length on top of that, airport officials say it could be detrimental for the airport's economic health.

"Ground delays are less frequent here than they are at most other airports nearby and the reason is because we have two good runways that we can use," said John Johnston, president of the Westchester Aviation Association. "But if all of a sudden there are more delays because that alternate runway can't be used by certain airplanes, you may lose airplanes that move to other airports. So there are economic risks here, too. It's easier to drive to Danbury and take off there than it is to sit here for an hour and a half and wait to take off."

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