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Neighbors Say: “Runway Is Not Needed” "Although the legal focus has mostly been on wetlands and water quality, our main objection to the runway is that it is an utter waste of money. It's a really DUMB project," said Larry Corvari, President of RCAA, commenting on what will happen next in the third-runway battle. According to Corvari and to experts on delay and capacity planning, the most important reason to oppose the runway is that it is simply not needed. According to the Port of Seattle & its buddies in the local FAA office, the stated purpose of the third-runway project is to allow arriving airplanes to fly closer together upon arrival during peak travel times in bad weather, thus reducing arrival delays. What arrival delays? Not arrival delays that have been experienced in the past – rather, arrival delays that might be expected IF there were to be a huge increase some time in the future in the number of flights into Sea-Tac during bad weather when aircraft must fly by instruments ("IFR") In fact, most outside experts — including the analysts at FAA national headquarters – believe that for the foreseeable future, the existing airport can handle the traffic without undue delays. Sea-Tac is NOT recognized as an airport with significant delay problems. There are many causes of delay, most of which will not be affected by more runways at Sea-Tac. [See FAA Benchmark Study] Are There Delays? Are They Weather-Related? Any experienced traveller expects delays, whether travelling by air, private auto, train, bus, or camel caravan. Most travellers flying into Sea-Tac have experienced delays. Most of those delays can be traced to congestion at the eight very crowded airports in other parts of the U.S. O'Hare (Chicago) is most notorious. Far too many flights touch down there. All too often, passengers coming into O'Hare are required to transfer to other flights. All too often, a flight bound to Seattle lands at O'Hare, & then languishes on the ground till other flights have cleared the area. The result? Delay, delay that cannot |