DENVER AIRPORT NOISE STUDY

By Max Maroney Castle View High School

Castle Rock, CO

• I was approached by the Colorado Department of Transportation to solve a problem involving the civilian use airports in the Denver Metro Area. As we all know, population is only increasing, and as population increases we see an increased need for housing, recreational, and social estates to be built. Though many prospective homeowners prefer not to live near an airport, it is a known fact that airports themselves are commercial centers, and their surrounding businesses are generally well over. However, we have yet to create a silent airplane, so the problem presented to me was ‘Where do we put homes that are near airports but have the least chance of being disturbed by aircraft noise?

THE PROBLEM

• I am doing this analysis on the three busiest, civilian use airports in the Denver Metro area. They are Centennial Airport (APA) in Centennial, Rocky Mountain Metropolitan (BJC) near Boulder, and Denver International (DEN), appx. 18 miles NE of downtown.

WHICH AIRPORTS?

• For my first analysis, I did a study of the current residential areas that are affected by noise pollution by aircraft. I’ll start with Centennial, as this is my home airport and the one closest to us. With data gathered from centennialairport.com, I visually displayed the areas surrounding APA that have noise complaints filed, with a graduated color for the areas with more reports. The green is areas will aircraft will be during the departure and arrival stages, with high power settings and low airspeed, the loudest phase of flights for any type of aircraft. The orange area is an intersect of the two, where airplanes will always be spewing noise on the earth.

WHERE IS IT A PROBLEM NOW?

ROCKY MOUNTAIN METRO Here we see the same principles applied to BJC, however,

my source site, jeffco.us, did not have the quantitative information regarding noise complaints, only residential areas.

• Here we see that Denver International Airport is in the middle of nowhere, as many of you can attest to. There are no residential areas within the traffic perimeter of DIA. The airport it

replaced, Stapleton International, was alternatively surrounded in neighborhoods, and was thus frequently attacked with noise complaints. I used business.flydenver.com for this

information.

DENVER INTERNATIONAL

• The information shown on the previous slides shows that the areas that are affected by noise pollution of overflying airplanes. Using the erase feature of ArcGIS I was able to remove these areas from the traffic area, as well as erasing land that the Department of Transportation had labeled as already in use. The possible areas for residential development are shown on the next slides.

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?

• Here we see that much of the area around Centennial is already is use, there are no predominantly large areas we can use for commercial centers, perhaps only a shopping center or apartment complexes in any given spot.

• Total Available Area is 21.39 square miles

CENTENNIAL AIRPORT (APA)

ROCKY MOUNTAIN METROPOLITAN (BJC)

• Here we see that BJC has a very large open use are on the western side of the airports traffic area, a very good location for some substantial residential application. • Total Available Area is 36.76 square miles.

• Denver has by far the largest surrounding area that can be bought and applied to commercial use. This was of course one of the reasons that it was built in the location that it was. In the future, as the Denver area expands in size, it will eventually envelop DIA, and when that time comes perhaps

this data could be used to avoid putting homes or other important commercial sites under the approach and departure paths of jet aircraft. • Total Available Area is 6,436.97 square miles

DENVER INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT (DEN)

Other Solutions

Aerospace giants Bombardier and Pratt & Whitney have recently began exploring solutions to the noise problem that lie in the airplanes themselves instead of the ground underneath them. New engines being developed may be able to reduce the noise level of a jet during the departure and arrival phases of flight by 3 to 5 decibels (Jansen, USA TODAY )

• I reported to the Department of Transportation that if we needed to expand upon commercial or residential areas, we should do it around Denver International. This is because it is the largest airport in the Denver area, and has the largest area surrounding it that is not already commercially used and that is outside of the noise pollution area beneath the approach and departure paths of airplanes.

IN CONCLUSION

• http://www.centennialairport.com/PDF/091312_NoiseReport.pdf • http://business.flydenver.com/community/noise/index.asp • http://business.flydenver.com/community/noise/reports/2q2012.pdf • http://jeffco.us/jeffco/airport_uploads/Noise_Report_2012.pdf • http://www.worldwatch.org/system/files/EP144B.pdf • http://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/flights/2013/06/20/jet-engine-noise/2401871/

SOURCES