No Relief For Some Homeowners Complaining Of Increased O'Hare Noise
CHICAGO (CBS) -- A North Side woman who convinced the city to install an official noise monitor at her home, 10 miles away from O'Hare International Airport, said the jet noise it measured would qualify her for soundproofing, but she lives too far away.
WBBM Newsradio's Mike Krauser reports the Federal Aviation Administration's decision not to conduct a new environmental impact study – as demanded by some lawmakers and activists due to skyrocketing noise complaints resulting from new flight patterns – means people like Judy Simpson must wait until 2025 for relief, when it will conduct a new study of the noise and pollution impact from new runway configurations.
"The noise monitor proved what I knew, but not what I want to be living under," she said.
Simpson said the city would not give her the results from the noise monitor at her home until she filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act.
"They're not being forthcoming with the data they're recording for us now," she said.
When she got the results, she found out the noise level at her home would qualify her for soundproofing if she lived within the established boundaries for the O'Hare Noise Compatibility Commission.
"So that means that homeowners out there who are living under the real noise contour – things that are actually happening versus the false noise contour map – that it will be at least 10 years," said Jac Charlier, who heads the Fair Allocation in Runways Coalition.
The FAiR Coalition has sought to spread the pain of jet noise at O'Hare, by more evenly distributing the number of flights using each runway, so flights are not concentrated over a small number of suburbs and Chicago neighborhoods.
Simpson, like other homeowners near O'Hare fed up with the noise impact from new flight patterns, has appealed her property tax assessment, and said she's considering moving to get away from the noise.