Business jets are parked close together in front of a hangar facility at Van Nuys Airport, which has seen its share of jet traffic increase over the last decade.
LOS ANGELES – Van Nuys Airport (VNY) in greater Los Angeles, one of the nation’s busiest general aviation airports for operations, has a storied history, supports 200 businesses, and says it contributes $2 billion to the economy of southern California.
Like other GA airports in California, however, VNY is facing pressure over noise and emissions from a surrounding community that has grown and pressed closer since its founding “amid 80 acres of trees and farmland” nearly 100 years ago. While its share of jet traffic has increased in the last decade, VNY’s ability to modernize existing facilities has been slowed over fears that it plans to attract more jets.
The FAA determines airport noise and access restrictions under the 1990 Airport Noise and Capacity Act, says VNY Airport Manager Paul Herrera, who points out that local efforts to close or reimagine other nearby airports could direct more traffic to VNY.
“We’re concerned about Santa Monica, Torrance and Whiteman airports,” Herrera says. “These three airports are getting significant public opposition. If these airports close, we’re going to get a lot of traffic in here—we’re already pushing 328,000 operations. We’re averaging between 5,000-6,000 operations-a-month of jet traffic.”
Owned and operated by Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA), a city department that also runs Los Angeles International Airport, VNY is undergoing a “vision study” exercise with community involvement to inform its use of land over the next 20 years. Additional land acquisitions by the city, which have enlarged the airport’s footprint to 730 acres, don’t have the same federal grant assurances or deed restrictions “but we’re mindful of how we can use that land to help ensure this is a prominent, viable airport as a reliever airport,” Herrera told BCA during a recent visit.
Plans call for LAWA to deliver VNY Vision Study recommendations to the Los Angeles Planning Department later this year, after which the city government will seek more public input.
Growth In Jet Traffic
Located in the San Fernando Valley 20 mi. northwest of central Los Angeles, VNY was founded by a group of citizens as Metropolitan Airport on Dec. 17, 1928. The U.S. government purchased the airport in 1942 following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and acquired additional land for the construction of Van Nuys Army Airfield. In 1949, the city of Los Angeles purchased the airport from the U.S. War Assets Administration for a token fee of $1 with the agreement that it allow the California Air National Guard to continue using the site.
Then known as San Fernando Valley Airport, the airfield was renamed Van Nuys Airport in 1957. The main runway (16R/34L) was extended to 8,001 ft. from 6,000 ft. in 1959. The Air National Guard turned over its base at VNY to the city in 1990 and relocated to a new facility on state-owned land adjacent to Naval Base Ventura County at Point Mugu.
VNY is home now to businesses including fixed-base operators Castle & Cooke Aviation, Clay Lacy Aviation, Jet Aviation, and Signature Aviation; maintenance facilities operated by Gulfstream, StandardAero, and Sun Air Jets; a U.S. Customs and Border Protection station, 19 flight schools, 830 based aircraft and helicopter operations of the Los Angeles and Los Angeles County fire departments and the city’s Department of Water and Power.
The airport is served by an FAA tower that operates from 6 a.m. to 10:45 p.m. daily and an instrument landing system supporting its main runway. In 2022, LAWA completed a $13 million reconstruction of Runway 16L/34R, which at 4,000 ft. in length is the shorter of its two parallel runways, dedicated to flight training aircraft.
Forty or 50 years ago, VNY accommodated twice as many operations (takeoffs and landings) as it does today, mainly flown by propeller aircraft. Its share of jet traffic has grown, however, from about 10-12% of total operations in the last 10-15 years to 22% today, Herrera says.
The community around the airport has grown too, pressing ever closer to its gates. A spike in private charter operations during the COVID-19 pandemic intensified nearby residents’ concerns over noise and emissions from larger jets running auxiliary power units as well as from piston aircraft burning leaded aviation gasoline. The “Roar of charter planes over San Fernando Valley has residents mad and worried,” states a recent Los Angeles Daily News headline.
“The airport has been here since 1928 but the community has creeped in thanks to our city planning department, which has allowed for these residential homes to be built as close as they are,” Herrera says. “Many of them were owner-occupied by the same men and women who worked at the airport, not only during the war but since then.”
Noise Abatement And Sustainability
LAWA introduced a Quieter Nights Program at VNY in 2020 after noise complaints increased—the result, it says, of revised NextGen flight paths drawn by the FAA, the displacement of air traffic from Santa Monica Airport due to a runway shortening, and new FAA Metroplex procedures at Hollywood-Burbank Airport. The voluntary program encourages jet operators to avoid flights at VNY between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. “whenever possible” and adds to an existing, partial curfew of Stage 2 noise-level aircraft departures dating to 1981.
VNY has also made strides toward environmental sustainability. Clay Lacy Aviation and Signature Aviation supply jets with sustainable aviation fuel, and Signature also supplies UL94 unleaded avgas for piston-engine aircraft. “The Park VNY,” a complex of hangars, tie-downs and office facilities dedicated to pilots of propeller aircraft, has installed a UL94 tank at its self-serve station that was inoperative during BCA’s visit because of a permitting issue.
Longtime tenant Aeroplex/Aerolease installed rooftop solar panels on its newest hangar on the east side of the airport in 2018, the first of several businesses to commit to solar projects. VNY recently gained approval to install ground-mounted solar panels on a sod farm north of the airport, Herrerra says.
New policies and developments are briefed to the Van Nuys Airport Citizens Advisory Council, a 20-member committee appointed by the LAWA Board of Airport Commissioners, the mayor of Los Angeles, and the City Council that meets on the first Tuesday of every month. The meetings provide a forum for nearby residents to engage airport management, and some residents—supported by political leaders—are obstinant about jet traffic, Herrera says.
“Many of the residents want the airport to shut down at 10 p.m. and not open until 7 a.m. and to have only law enforcement-type services and life flights for organ transports and things of that nature,” Herrera says. “But we can’t do that because we have the Airport Noise Capacity Act and requirements to remain open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. At the end of the day, we made obligations to the federal government to operate the land as an airport.”
Development Chilling Effect
The neighborhood of Van Nuys lies within the district represented since 2023 by Los Angeles City Councilor Imelda Padilla, who has called for a moratorium on new aviation development at the airport until LAWA updates its current Van Nuys Airport Plan—a 20-year land-use compatibility strategy issued in 2006. She also has proposed that flight restrictions be enacted in the VNY Vision Study, which is a separate planning initiative.
In February, the City Council approved a motion introduced by Padilla and another councilor to assemble a citizens advisory council on the future development of VNY, the Daily News reported.
The anti-development sentiment came into play earlier this year when a City Council committee rejected a proposal by Helinet Aviation to build a new hangar in place of its current facilities at VNY, which are in need of repair. While the new facility would be large enough for jets, Helinet operates helicopters for charter flights, sightseeing tours, aerial film production, newsgathering and organ transport; it is the primary emergency helicopter provider for Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles.
Herrera says the opposition has prevented VNY from awarding new leases and issuing requests for proposals (RFP) to replace dilapidated hangars on the airport grounds as well as to install new infrastructure for future advanced air mobility (AAM) aircraft. The delay in its ability to release RFPs brings into question whether a master tenant can make new investments in the property.
In January, Clay Lacy Aviation and AAM vehicle developer Overair announced a partnership to develop electric charging facilities for Overair’s Butterfly electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft at Clay Lacy’s John Wayne Airport and VNY locations—a plan that could be slowed at VNY.
“There’s been a delay in our ability to push out aeronautical leases—[the] award of leases—to a winning bidder so that they can develop and invest in the power supply on a leasehold,” Herrera says. “That’s the delay we’re seeing with Clay Lacy here at Van Nuys. They haven’t been able to get a 20- or 30-year lease that could allow them to make the power infrastructure improvements.”
The Van Nuys Airport Plan, the closest thing the airport has to a comprehensive master plan, remains in effect until 2026 and allows for the release of aeronautical RFPs, Herrera contends.
“The challenge we have is that it’s a delay tactic by the community and some elected officials that see the current plan, which is still valid, as a tool for us to release aeronautical RFPs,” he says. “Their argument is that any modernization at the airport is an invitation to grow—you’re going to have more jets.”
The current airport plan beats no plan, argues Herrera, who is committed to making improvements at VNY.
“We’re very proud of the rich history of Van Nuys Airport and how it’s contributed to the national airspace system across the country, across the world,” he says. “We do intend to modernize the facility but we have to do it in a thoughtful, methodical manner and not piecemeal the RFPs.”
VNY’s critics want to keep it as an “older airport that only focuses on propeller-driven aircraft [and] helicopter operations … but not allow for the growth of jets to continue to happen at Van Nuys,” he says. “By modernizing the facility,” the critics suspect, “you’re inviting them to come.”
Related Content
