Los Angeles International Airport: A Case Study

I. Summary The Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) is considered to have noise issues. LAX is owned by Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA). LAX is the sixth busiest airport in the world and third in the United States (LAWA, n.d. c). This also creates noise issues from arriving and departing aircraft. These noise issues can lead to different health issues such as hearing loss and sleep disruption. LAX is taking countermeasures to reduce the noise impact area. These include banning noisy aircraft, preferential runway system, and modified departure routes. Improving the departure and arrival routes will further reduce noise issues. This analysis evaluates the noise issues and provides recommendations to alleviate or solve them.
II. Problem

These include but are not limited to hearing loss, speech interference, sleep disruption, and loss of productivity (Environmental Protection Agency, 2009). 35,000 people are directly affected as they live in the noise impact area with a noise of 65dB and over (LAWA, 2015). Since the surrounding of LAX is densely populated more people can suffer from these noise effects.
IV. Noise Issues
Issue 1. High noise levels inside houses close to LAX. Positive Actions. In 1997 LAX has established a soundproofing program for houses in the 65dB and over noise impact areas (LAWA, n.d. e). The houses get free sound insulation to reduce noise levels inside. During the program over 7,300 houses were soundproofed (LAWA, n.d. e). Another option in the soundproofing program was the acquisition of land. They would buy houses from the citizens and leave the land vacant. Needs Improvement. After June 1, 2010 it was not possible to participate in this program anymore, even if you live in the noise impact zone. LAX is currently waiting on a new updated 65dB or more noise impact zone map. This will take a while. After that it will take some time before a new program is started and more soundproofing is done.
Issue 2. Old aircraft produce a lot of

LAX has established a Community Noise Roundtable in September, 2000 (LAWA, n.d. a). This roundtable provides a mechanism that attempts to ensure cooperation between the Airport and local impacted communities in achieving noise impact reduction to those communities, wherever possible, without shifting noise from one community to another (LAWA, n.d. a). By cooperating with all the parties involved, including the FAA and airline industry, better courses of action can be identified to mitigate the noise issues.
V. Recommendation(s)
Recommendation 1. Increase the rate of implementing the new NextGen arrival and departure routes. If all aircraft fly the precision GPS routes the overall noise impact zone will reduce. For air traffic controllers it will be easier to control and separate them as they will all fly the exact same route. This will reduce the need for deviations from the published routes, which in turn reduces noise on the ground.
Recommendation 2. With the NextGen program the option for continuous descend approaches at LAX should be implemented as well. This would allow aircraft to fly from cruise altitude until landing with almost idle thrust. Besides fuel benefits and reduced emissions it will also reduce noise issues throughout Los