SFO airplane route changes slightly

Maps of the new and former route would be useful for a sufficiently informative article.

Why is there a picture of a Surf Air plane? They fly to San Carlos NOT SFO.

Here's a link to some photos of planes actually landing at SFO
Web Link

There is a photo of a Surf Air airplane. Will Surf Air use this route? Or is this just a random airplane photo since this article is about airplanes?

Great job FAA - stick it to the low income/low political influence neighborhoods East of 101.

Shame on you!

"The Surf Air Pilatus PC-12 plane comes in for arrival at the San Carlos Airport." Seriously? This story has nothing to do with either Surf Air or the San Carlos Airport. Was this intentional or just lazy?

At least the photo identifies the Pilatus as coming in to San Carlos. Just laziness I think. What would it have taken to go outside and take a picture of one of the thousands of aircraft inbound to SFO that pass overhead every day?

Carpenter,

Sadly it's no surprise that your statement about the FAA is wrong given that as close as you are to the MPFPD you repeatedly offer incorrect details about its operation.

The FAA's reconfiguration of South West approaches into the Class B is about increasing safety. If you think it was allowed because of socio-economic factors you're wrong,and every controller at NorCal Approach and Oakland Center will tell you this. Next time you fly in from LAX, SAN, SNA or PSP you may even want to quietly thank those that looked out for your welfare as you gaze out the window.

Now, if you want to talk about sticking it to the communities East of 101, let's examine why the Menlo Park Fire District never allowed the Quint at Station 77 to be sent to incidents as a Truck. Lobbing inaccuracies about things you really should know about doesn't garner support for your opinions related to topics outside of your wheelhouse like this one.

As an IFR rated pilot with well over a thousand hour of flight time IN the Bay area I deeply appreciate and fully understand the FAA's commitment to safety.

That does not change the fact that this change shifts traffic from communities West of 101 to communties East o 101.

As a follower of this topic on the Palo Alto Weekly, Peter has the optics correct. A small group of people, mainly in Palo Alto, scream bloody murder about airplane noise. Phone apps are used to automatically report -any- airplane flying overhead as a nuisance. Politicians are reluctantly involved and the flights magically shift a quarter mile from over the wealthy neighborhoods to over the poor ones. I'm also a pilot, albeit only VFR and not current so I do understand what NextGen was trying to achieve, but this sure looks like a solution to noisy citizens rather than noisy aircraft.

In answer to that last statement, it’s not a small group of people upset about the jet noise. It’s a large group that ranges all over the Peninsula and down to Santa Cruz (where Nexgen suddenly and massively increased their noise levels).

I never understand why people get into fights about this. Can’t we all agree that excessive air traffic and the resulting noise, fumes, and damage to our sleep is a bad thing? Ask any of the air traffic controllers at SFO—-they would vastly prefer fewer planes and none of the giant international eavies.

Squeky wheel:

Nexgen is about moving MORE aircraft more efficiently. If there wasn't a demand for this increase in air traffic it wouldn't be happening. So, you can thank the increased population of the Bay Area driving an increased demand for more flights.

"Under the new route, residents of East Palo Alto could find planes overhead more frequently."

Oh, thank god, finally! We East Palo Alto residents have been begging for years for more SFO noise. PAO traffic has failed repeatedly to generate it's promised amount of noise, so obviously we were driven to cast our net farther afield. Nextgen helped a little, well a lot actually, but boy did we lobby tirelessly for that and we still have nowhere near our fair share of the noise. You'd think it'd be simple. For heaven's sake, it's been scientifically proven that flying over East Palo Alto is the only way to keep those airplanes safe! Consider gravity and the Coriolis effect! It's clear that the route must go 'over the bay' (that's our euphemism for 'over East Palo Alto' to try to avoid having people realize just how much of the air traffic we're hogging - mwahahahaha.) Just direct all air traffic over us, do it now! San Carlos airport needs to get in the action, too, their routes over Atherton are far too dangerous.