Holman Field: What can be built in the flight path?

The public's safety is being weighed against a host of economic factors as officials try to work out a plan that will dictate what can be built in the flight path of the St. Paul Downtown Airport.

The state-mandated plan is about 30 years past due and intended to minimize damage if a plane crash were to happen. At the same time, officials say, existing buildings, potential development and job creation need to be factored in.

That balancing act, given the airport's urban location, means the plan will probably be less restrictive than state minimum safety standards that have sizable no-build areas off the ends of runways. St. Paul says it could lose thousands of potential jobs and $2 million in annual property taxes if it adopted the state's standards.

"There's a tradeoff in everything we do today," said Gary Workman, director of the Minnesota Department of Transportation's aeronautics office. MnDOT administers aviation safety, and the commissioner ultimately signs off on the plans.

"How many people do you have to have killed at an intersection before you put in a stop light?" Workman asked. "You can't put stoplights at every corner."

Aviation crashes are rare, but many that do occur happen within 2 miles of airports. Last summer, eight people died when a small jet crashed off the runway in Owatonna, Minn. Between 1988 and 2007, eight accidents were attributable to the St. Paul airport, according to a 2008 safety study by consultant HNTB. Four people died in a rare midair collision that dropped remnants of two planes in Lowertown in 1992.

The study showed that the probability of a crash at the St. Paul airport is less than one in 10 million flight operations.

St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman said the airport, also known as Holman Field, is critical to the region. A 2005 Wilder Research study estimated that it brings in about $112 million to the local economy.

It also has attracted noise complaints and other community dust-ups over the years.

The airport serves mostly corporate jets, as well as some general aviation and military traffic. It's one of the busiest in the Metropolitan Airport Commission's six reliever-airport system. The biggest safety concern is the airport's 6,500-foot-long main runway.

Using a less-restrictive safety zone plan could potentially yield an additional $2.1 million in annual property taxes and create 8,500 jobs and 1,800 housing units, according to a city analysis. State minimum standards, it said, would yield $107,000 in annual property taxes and create 1,900 jobs and no new housing.

State safety zones are divided into two components, "A" and "B." The A zone doesn't allow for any structures, while the B zone allows some limited building. The B zone prohibits schools, churches and other uses that draw lots of people.

A 16-acre site slated for housing under the Lafayette Bridge never came to fruition.

Planning for a new $185 million Lafayette Bridge is moving along and could bring potential problems because a new bridge will be east of the existing one, jutting closer into the airport flight path and possibly pushing hazardous power lines farther east.

There has been talk of putting a minor-league ballpark in Lowertown, near where a Central Corridor light-rail maintenance facility is expected to go. That could be a problem because of the number of people it would draw.

Plan is way overdue

According to Minnesota law, every airport in the state must have a safety-zoning land-use plan -- or be in a good-faith process of developing one -- to receive state and federal money for projects. The MAC, which is responsible for implementing safety ordinances at the seven metro-area airports it operates, hasn't followed through with its relievers, despite a 1973 document saying that it would.

A joint airport zoning board, or JAZB, was convened in the early 1980s to create a safety zone ordinance for the St. Paul airport. Significant process was made, but things stopped when the city wanted the MAC to indemnify it against potential legal action by property owners who might lose the use of their land. That was in 1983.

Little happened since until last year, when the MAC agreed to indemnify St. Paul.

When asked what prompted the recent push to get a zoning ordinance, officials from St. Paul, MAC and MnDOT didn't have a specific reason.

"We have been acting as if the zoning ordinance was there," Coleman said.

Projects continued

Workman, who has been in his post two years, said he couldn't speak to why nothing was done sooner to get plans in place. Had he been in charge in previous years, he said he probably would have permitted the money to go to the MAC because many of the projects were for safety improvements.

"You don't invest millions in a facility and let it deteriorate because of a lack of zoning," Workman said.

Now, however, St. Paul and officials from South St. Paul and West St. Paul, have been working with the MAC for more than a year to put a safety zone plan in place.

It probably will be less restrictive than the state's recommendations. An airport may deviate from those with the approval of the transportation commissioner. That was done in 2004, when then-Commissioner Carol Molnau signed off on relaxations of the safety zone plan around Minneapolis-St. Paul International to accommodate big-dollar development in Bloomington. It was against the recommendation of MnDOT aviation safety experts.

The St. Paul airport discussion continues, and the public will have a chance to weigh in on a proposed plan after the group working on it meets in June to decide a hearing date.