Night flight fight takes off

Raffy Boudjikanian

raffy.boudjikanian@transcontinental.ca

Aéroports de Montréal (ADM), the authority which runs Pierre-Elliot Trudeau International Airport in Dorval said both citizen concerns about an upsurge in night flights is premature and that municipalities ultimately have no authority in planning airline flight paths.

"ADM operates flights according to Transport Canada regulations," said spokesperson Anne Marcotte when asked if resolutions by cities surrounding the airport demanding a complete stop on all night flights above residential areas may persuade ADM.

The announcements come on the heels of a recent resolution by Lachine asking for no night time flights, and a similar petition by Dorval asking its residents to sign up, following the city's last city council meeting.

About 20 residents filled up the usually-more-vacant council meeting room in Dorval on May 26.

Dorval resident and member of a citizens' opposition group called Citoyens de Dorval pour la démocratie (Dorval citizens for Democracy) Jean Clément said city hall should write a resolution like the one in Lachine . "I have no confidence in the ADM," he told council when Mayor Edgar Rouleau answered the city would do its best, but there might be a problem if Dorval, Lachine and Pointe Claire, the three cities immediately surrounding the airport, all asked for a ban on night flights.

"If you have to have flights (at night), please be fair," Rouleau said the city would ask the airport. Since then, however, a petition has been released by the city asking for a total ban on all night flights except for emergencies.

According to Marcotte, the airport stopped operating flights between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. since September 2006, except in cases of emergencies or delays. However, Clément, a resident of St. Louis Avenue near the lake of the same name, claimed that rule has been broken with increasing frequency since then. "It keeps getting worse," he added.

The airport is currently testing new flight routes over Highway 13, said Marcotte. She added ADM passed several resolutions about noise reduction at its annual general meeting three weeks ago, including plans on reducing the noise footprint of the airport, and limiting flights to a height of 2,500 feet or higher near residential areas.

Pointe Claire Mayor Bill McMurchie said their city council passed a resolution at their last meeting asking that the airport does not add new flights over their city. "We have more than our fair share of flights as it is," he said.