Letter of the day: New runway patterns should be permanent

Updated: August 30, 2007 - 7:54 PM

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The new runway repairs at the airport are in many ways one of the best things to have happened to southwest Minneapolis in the last 20 years. Before the repairs began there were 200 to 300 ear-splitting overflights every day, making outdoor conversation almost impossible. On the other hand, since last weekend there have been days with simply no overflights at all and others with less than 20 or 30 flights. For now, our gardens are our own again, and nice evenings and weekend days outdoors are possible without the everlasting din of the airport; normal life outdoors is a reality.

The control tower says that the runway usage pattern during the present repairs is "absolutely safe" -- otherwise it would not be used -- and surely nothing can be safer than absolutely safe.

Why can't the new flight patterns be made permanent? Or at least used on alternate weeks? In the interest of fairness, balance and decency, why should the neighbors of southwest Minneapolis be discriminated against and treated as second-class citizens by the airport when there are other ways of running the airport?

Would any other city tolerate this situation? I bet if the airport commissioners lived in southwest Minneapolis there would be something done overnight.

JAMES SERRIN, MINNEAPOLIS

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