By Brian Trompeter
Joining a growing regional chorus, the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors unanimously passed a resolution May 23 that opposed relaxing the slot-and-perimeter rule governing the number of long-distance flights going to and from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA).
Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD) was built to serve international and long-distance customers, but National Airport was intended to accommodate shorter flights, said Board of Supervisors Chairman Jeff McKay (D), who read the resolution.
“However, time and again, Congress has made exemptions to the rule, allowing a greater number of longer flights to depart from DCA, which has negatively impacted communities around DCA with more airplane noise and hampered the ability of IAD to achieve its economic-development potential,” the resolution read.
“IAD is now under the same geographical constraints as DCA and must be allowed to grow into the long-distance hub that Congress intended when it established MWAA and the slot-and-perimeter rule,” it continued.
Northern Virginia officials prepared to do battle again after U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) introduced legislation May 10 that would, if enacted, would permit 56 additional daily takeoff and landing “slots” and exempt them from the airport’s perimeter rule, which prohibits non-stop flights longer than 1,250 miles from the airport.
National Airport now accommodates 20 round-trip flights for destinations beyond the 1,250-mile perimeter. Those slots are allocated to American Airlines (six flights), Alaska Airlines (five), Frontier Airlines (three), Delta Air Lines and United Airlines (two each) and JetBlue and Southwest Airlines (one apiece).
Officials put the perimeter rules in place decades ago – the original flight limit was 650 miles – to aid the growth of Washington Dulles International Airport. New York’s La Guardia Airport is the only other U.S. airport with perimeter restrictions.
The last effort to significantly loosen perimeter restrictions occurred during the 2018 reauthorization of the Federal Aviation Administration and local legislators successfully fought off that attempt.
Congress maintains oversight of National and Dulles airports, but since the 1980s has delegated the facilities’ day-to-day operations to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority. MWAA board members on May 17 indicated they oppose the proposed perimeter-rule changes and U.S. Rep. Don Beyer (D-8th) has spoken in a similar vein.
The Board of Supervisors agreed to send a letter to the leaders of the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation that opposes the potential rule changes, citing potential detrimental impacts on the county’s economy and community.
“This battle has been fought many times,” said Supervisor Penelope Gross (D-Mason), adding that such attempts to relax National Airport’s slot-and-perimeter rule usually came from legislators living in the southwest part of the country.
“But now with Metrorail serving Dulles International Airport, that really removes some of the concerns, I think, that members of Congress have about the ability to get to the airport. Yes, you can take Metro to National, but you can also take Metro to Dulles.”
While Mason District is not in National Airport’s direct flight paths, Gross said her office has been receiving more complaints about airplane and helicopter noise.
“I’m glad that we’re stepping up and doing this,” Gross said of the resolution and letter. “I really hope it will have the appropriate effect.”
Congress made perimeter-rule changes a decade and a half ago without any public engagement, said Supervisor Daniel Storck (D-Mount Vernon). Fairfax County Executive Bryan Hill has been working with officials in Arlington, Alexandria and Prince George’s County, Md., on engaging a consultant with the idea of mitigating National’s noise impacts.
“This has been a longstanding issue,” said Supervisor Walter Alcorn (D-Hunter Mill). “When the airports were first transferred from the federal government, the whole plan all along . . . was to have Dulles be the growth airport.”
McKay said the problem often stemmed from “rogue” members of Congress who wanted to make their lives easier when flying between the nation’s capital and their districts.
“It is so parochial at times,” he said.
Current supervisors may not know it, but they are not the first in their posts to dabble in aviation issues.
In the 1970s, the then-Board of Supervisors filed suit in an attempt to prevent Concorde flights of British Airways and Air France to use Dulles, citing noise and environmental concerns.
That quixotic challenge likely was solely to placate local constituents who had demanded a response, but a federal judge quickly reminded county officials that they were not entitled to their own foreign or environmental policies independent of the federal government’s. The suit was quickly rejected.
