Bumping Heads: Airport Airspace Restrictions

October 12, 2009 4:21 PM

Not only are our airports land constrained, but they are also inefficiently laid out with intersecting runways and conflicting airspace.

Ideally, each airport should have a five-to ten-mile circle of airspace around it; but as the graphic shows, all three overlap. LaGuardia, Newark and Kennedy Airports each operate with less than half of their optimal airspace. Clearly, all of the airports are constrained by each of their neighbor's intruding reach.

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