Airplane activity has increased dramatically in the past few years, and
it’s only going to get worse. The City of Santa Barbara has realized what a
cash cow it has in the airport, and the city is milking it for all it’s worth.
To encourage commercial airlines to come into SBA, the city is waiving landing
fees. To encourage private pilots and general aviation, it is reconfiguring its
facilities for new, fixed-based operators.
Plane traffic starts around 6 a.m. and often can still be heard at
midnight. To quantify the noise, the airport uses an antiquated FAA protocol
that requires community members to identify a wayward airplane, note the time
and location of the flyover (and even its altitude!), and call this information
in to a hot line. A staff member aggregates complaints by month and
neighborhood. She then writes a letter to the offending airlines pointing out
the preferred noise abatement program route, which is over the ocean and across
More Mesa.
Unfortunately, compliance with the program is strictly voluntary, and the
airport has no way to enforce it. Moreover, the city has a disincentive to
censure the very airlines it is so desperately courting. The situation is even
worse with private planes. The airport doesn’t seem to know who is coming and
going, much less regulating their flight patterns. Instead of the Friendly
Skies over Santa Barbara, these days it is more like the Wild, Wild West.