Centennial Airport expects to have its recently installed noise monitors officially collecting data toward the end of the year, providing data that could help mitigate noise from the second-busiest general aviation airport in the country.
The structures look like a 20-foot light pole with the monitor on top. The have been placed in 12 spots — six in Arapahoe County and six in Douglas County — that regularly have Centennial Airport traffic flying over. They were installed last year, but due to some glitches and working with the manufacturer, they have been recording data only since July as part of a beta test phase.
The noise monitors are hooked into radar tracking so the airport will be able to link noise with routes.
With a year’s worth of data, the airport hopes to be able to mitigate noise for surrounding communities, said Mike Fronapfel, deputy director of planning and development for Centennial Airport.
“It was something the community had really been pushing for for quite a while,” he said.
The airport is collecting the data and working with surrounding entities on the noise issue.
“It’s basically balancing the needs of the community with the needs of the airport and the economic development of the area, so it’s definitely a fine balance between the two,” said Scott Drexler, noise and planning specialist with Centennial Airport.
A noise monitoring system study was finished in 2008, and the Centennial Airport Community Noise Roundtable was created in 2009..
“It is hard to measure how much is a lot of noise, and with these noise monitors, we can detect how many decibels it was and where it was. It gives us a lot of information we wouldn’t have otherwise,” said Harold Anderson, current chair of the roundtable, which includes Lone Tree, Centennial, Greenwood Village, Castle Rock, Parker, Aurora, Castle Pines, Arapahoe and Douglas counties.
Anderson, a councilman in Lone Tree, recently appointed a subcommittee to work with the airport on collecting the data, which he said will identify problem areas.
Anderson said some residents have proposed getting rid of the airport, but he said it’s too important to economic development. The airport sees about 300,000 flights a year.
A representative of the South Metro Chamber of Commerce did not return calls for comment.
Bette Todd, a Greenwood Village District 3 councilwoman who sits on the roundtable, pointed out getting the noise monitors erected took longer than it should have.
“I believe the airport could be doing more,” Todd said. “It shouldn’t have taken a roundtable to produce the Fly Quiet brochures (for pilots). If they were concerned about the noise problem, they could’ve done that a long time ago.”
Todd said while Greenwood Village has the most households complaining about airport noise, Centennial the largest number of residents complaining.
Clayton Woullard: 303-954-2953, cwoullard@denverpost.com or twitter.com/yhClayton
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