A year and a half-long legal dispute between a Longmont skydiving company and anti-skydiving noise advocates will go to trial Monday in Boulder County District Court.
Kimberly Gibbs of Gunbarrel, Gibbs's organization Citizens for Quiet Skies and six other individual plaintiffs sued Mile Hi Skydiving over the noise Mile Hi's planes make when flying over Boulder County homes.
Mile Hi flies its planes out of Longmont's Vance Brand Municipal Airport, particularly a purple DeHavilland Twin Otter. The planes leave the airport, reach altitude in a flight box that reaches out over unincorporated Boulder County, drop the skydivers and return the airport.
Gibbs and others with the Citizens for Quiet Skies group have been speaking for years at meetings of the Longmont City Council meetings and the Airport Advisory Board, saying that the Twin Otter is particularly noisy as it ascends and descends. In the lawsuit, they argue that even though Mile Hi is ultimately governed by the Federal Aviation Administration, the court should still be able to stop its operation from being a nuisance.
"In short, the choices that Mile-Hi makes when conducting its skydiving operations. . .are choices within the discretion of Mile Hi and within the discretion of this Court to limit," the attorney for the plaintiffs wrote in the trial brief filed March 31.
"In these discretionary matters, Mile Hi must operate in a reasonable manner and may not interfere with Plaintiffs' quiet enjoyment of their properties."
Others in the city say that the people who complain about the noise are being overly sensitive about the planes and the skydivers.
Lawyers for Mile Hi, meanwhile, argue in the suit that the skydiving company is following all FAA regulations and the plaintiffs' requests would impose on the federal government's ability to regulate air traffic.
"If the Plaintiffs wish to change the noise emissions, flight patterns, and/or curfews of the (sic) Mile Hi, their sole remedy is to convince the Airport or the City of Longmont to conduct a (noise study) and make recommendations to the FAA," wrote Mile Hi's attorney in the their brief, also filed March 31.
Former Airport Manager Tim Barth commissioned a preliminary noise study by local firm Terracon before he resigned his position in January. The study found that average plane noise in several areas subject to complaints was not significantly higher than background noise. The Terracon study cost the city $2,797 while City Attorney Eugene Mei wrote in an email to the City Council that a more extensive study the FAA requires would cost roughly $300,000. The more expensive study has not yet been commissioned.
While the plaintiffs in the case originally claimed that Mile Hi was negligent, trespassing and a nuisance, those claims were winnowed down by three summary judgements issued by the court. Citizens for Quiet Skies originally asked the court to award them money for alleged reduction in home values, money for loss of enjoyment of their homes, damages for emotional stress and money for court fees.
The plaintiffs additionally asked the court to grant an injunction against Mile Hi so that the company would have to limit its hours of operation in the future and changing flight patterns.
In summary judgements, the court dismissed most of Citizens for Quiet Skies' claims, leaving the organization only able to pursue the injunction asking Mile Hi to change its ways. The individual plaintiffs in the case are still seeking compensation for what they say has been a devaluation in their homes' value due to the noise from Mile Hi.
Original article can be found here: http://www.timescall.com
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