Petitioning: Palo Alto City Council, Congresswoman Anna Eshoo, Congresswoman Jackie Speier, Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian, State Senator Jerry Hill, Assembly Member Marc Berman, and United States Senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris.

Aircraft noise is increasing at an alarming rate over our communities. This has a significant impact on our quality of life, including disruption of sleep. The FAA is instituting a new air traffic control system called NextGen, which concentrates flight paths over our homes and schools. Over the past 15 years, SFO arrivals have increased 23%, but flight paths have shifted, increasing flights over Palo Alto 185%, from 70 to 200 arrivals per day. With six airports routing traffic over Palo Alto and neighboring communities, it is critical to monitor and apply best practices to abate aircraft noise.

Furthermore, in 2000, Congresswoman Anna Eshoo and then-Mayor Gary Fazzino, announced an agreement with the FAA and SFO to route flights at a minimum altitude of 5000 feet over Palo Alto in an effort to reduce noise, but planes are now flying much lower. Oakland, San Jose and San Carlos airports are also increasing traffic over our communities with flights as low as 2000 feet.

We ask you, our elected officials, to exercise your full influence and resources to address this problem. In addition to your working with the airports conducting traffic here, we ask you to appeal urgently to Congress, the FAA, and air traffic control to work effectively with communities on noise abatement.
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To learn more, see the comprehensive story by Sue Dremann in the Palo Alto Weekly October 24, 2014, "Unfriendly Skies" at http://www.paloaltoonline.com/print/story/2014/10/24/unfriendly-skies-residents-city-officials-gear-up-to-fight-increased-airplane-noise