County joins group seeking more runways

Thursday, Feb. 1, 2001 | 10:56 a.m.

Clark County's Department of Aviation will join with airline companies today to beg for more runways at major U.S. airports.

Randy Walker, aviation director, will attend a press conference in Washington, D.C., announcing the formation of the Runways National Coalition, department spokeswoman Hilarie Grey said Wednesday.

She said that while McCarran International Airport recently added a runway, it was one of only six major airports in the country to add a runway in the last decade.

Coalition members argue that the record-shattering delays in the summer of 2000 were exacerbated by the lack of new runways. Delays over the course of the year were 47 percent over the number in 1998.

Grey said that although McCarran added a runway, travelers to or from Las Vegas can still experience delays when traveling through other cities, thanks in large part to the "hub-and-spoke" system used by most airlines.

Jose Juves, a spokesman for the coalition and for the Massachusetts Port Authority, said the need for new runways is right now, and nationwide.

"Everyone agrees that there is no investment we can make in aviation that would have more impact on delays than building more runways," Juves said.

The process for approving and building the runways needs to be streamlined. Anybody opposing new runways can effectively block their construction through procedural maneuvers, Juves said.

And even when there is no opposition, a new runway can take more than a decade for approval and construction, he said. That process needs to be speeded up.

"What the coalition is saying is we have a crisis today, and we can't have a solution that will take decades," he said.

The Massachusetts Port Authority operates Logan International Airport and also promotes other, smaller airports in New England. Juves said the drive to get more runways doesn't replace the need to direct more traffic to regional airports, a move supported by advocates for flying consumers.

Juves said Delta, American and United airlines have joined the coalition, as well as airport administrations nationwide.