Riordan Offers Smaller Airport Expansion Plan

Mayor Richard Riordan, having failed to generate political momentum for a massive expansion of Los Angeles International Airport, said Monday that he now favors a more modest proposal that would benefit the regional economy without as much impact on the community around the airport.

“This plan makes a lot more sense,” Riordan said in an interview. “It costs a lot less, and it’s a better thought-out plan.”

Critics of the mayor’s efforts at LAX resoundingly disagreed.

“This is a charade,” said Mike Gordon, the mayor of El Segundo and leader of a regional effort against the LAX expansion. “This is not anything other than what they already have proposed.”

Councilwoman Ruth Galanter, who supports regional airport growth but has long battled Riordan over his vision for LAX, said she believes the latest proposal offers nothing new or worthwhile.

“What I think this tells us is that they’re not ready yet to address the fact that they’re going to sink an incredible amount of resources in one small airport,” she said. “It’s still going to increase the noise, it’s still going to increase the air pollution.”

For more than a year, Riordan has argued the importance of expanding Southern California’s airport capacity and has highlighted the key role that LAX will play in any regional solution. Opponents have countered by arguing that although airport expansion is key to the region’s economy, LAX already bears too much of the burden.

They suggest shifting more traffic to other airports such as Ontario and Palmdale, two facilities owned by Los Angeles.

Until Monday, that debate largely turned on the assumption that the expansion at LAX would be built around adding a runway. In addition, the expansion options discussed for that facility have included construction of a second terminal and a ring road intended to lessen traffic congestion.

Together, those improvements would allow LAX to go from accommodating about 60 million passengers a year to 98 million, as well as nearly doubling the airport’s cargo capacity.

On Monday, Riordan endorsed a slightly scaled-down version of that plan. Under it, the airport would not add a fifth runway, but would relocate its northernmost runway and lengthen it slightly.

That would permit planes to land side-by-side, allowing a modest increase in flights, as well as making it possible to accommodate larger planes. As a result, Riordan said the expanded airport would accommodate 92 million passengers a year, less than the original plan but still a significant increase. As with the five-runway options, the new proposal would allow for roughly a doubling in cargo traffic, Riordan said, because many cargo planes land at night.

Estimates for the original expansion range from $10 billion to $12 billion, a mammoth bill that would make the LAX effort the most expensive public works project in the nation. Riordan said the new proposal, which was developed in part by outgoing airport director Jack Driscoll and in part by his successor, Lydia Kennard, would be much cheaper and would inflict less disruption on the communities near LAX.

Riordan’s proposal would require relocating 247 businesses near the airport, rather than 383 under the five-runway option. The plan would cost $360 million less in land acquisition and would save even more on construction, Riordan said.

Time and again, changes in approach and new problems have set back the expansion effort. The environmental impact report for the project, once anticipated last year and most recently promised by this fall, would have to be amended to accommodate the new proposal.

But Kennard said she did not believe that the latest proposal would significantly set back the timing. She said that much of the work supporting the five-runway proposals would be transferable to the four-runway approach.

Riordan’s term ends in two years, and the mayor said Monday that he hopes to have ground broken for the project by then. “That’s my profound hope,” he said.

Opponents said the mayor will be disappointed. Once the environmental analysis is complete, they said, the public will need time to respond and the airport will have to take those comments into consideration in finalizing its report.

“This coalition is prepared to do whatever is necessary” to stop Riordan’s plans for LAX, Gordon said.

“Break ground by the end of his term?” Galanter added. “That makes you wonder what he’s been smoking.”