Businesses at Van Nuys Airport have been fearing the economic impact of a federal proposal to phase out older, Stage 2 aircraft, including the popular Gulfstream II business jet.

But now they have a more immediate concern on their hands: a decision by the L.A. Board of Airport Commissioners to ban the noisy planes over the next nine years.

The decision, which still must be seconded by the City Council, is less onerous than the proposed federal ban stretched out only over five years, but it is still drawing criticism from the San Fernando Valley business interests.

“We are disappointed,” said Brendan Huffman, president of the Valley Industry & Commerce Association, a Sherman Oaks-based business group. “(The airport) is a multi-billion dollar economic engine.”

Van Nuys Airport is the largest general aviation airport in the country and hosts more Stage 2 aircraft than virtually every other airport. The planes are used primarily for business and charter purposes and were manufactured until the mid-1980s. Though there are still about 1,000 in use, most of the aircraft have been put out of service as the quieter Stage 3 and newer Stage 4 planes have become the industry standards.

VICA has lobbied against efforts to ban Stage 2 planes, saying the 32 such aircraft based at Van Nuys Airport contribute more than $400 million each year to the local economy through the maintenance, fuel and other businesses that keep them flying.

Robert Rodine, an airport consultant who has studied Stage 2 planes for the association, said though the planes generate a number of community noise complaints, neighbors seem to complain just as much about other aircraft.

“By banning the Stage 2 aircraft, they’re not going to ameliorate the concerns of the people who complain,” he said.

Clay Lacy Aviation Inc., a Van Nuys charter company with one of the largest fleets of Stage 2 planes in the country, said it stands to lose as much as $15 million per year if the planes are phased out.

The federal government is set to decide later this year whether to ban the planes nationwide as part of the reauthorization bill for the Federal Aviation Administration.

Bridge Rehab

A new project may give truckers some reprieve from the congestion that chokes the nation’s largest port complex on a daily basis but it could be a while before it becomes a reality.

The California Department of Transportation and the Alameda Corridor Transportation Authority plan to hold a public hearing this week on a proposal to replace the seismically deficient Commodore Schuyler F. Heim Bridge in the Port of Los Angeles and build a new elevated roadway to relieve some port truck traffic.

The project will create a four-lane expressway between Ocean Boulevard and Alameda Street that will bypass three traffic signals and five railroad crossings, and in the process divert as much as 8 percent of port truck traffic from existing freeways. The new roadway would connect Terminal Island to warehousing and distribution facilities in the South Bay, as well as several major freeways.

Caltrans and the Alameda Corridor group released a joint environmental impact report this month that presented a series of alternatives to the project, including leaving the bridge intact or connecting to a different portion of Alameda Street. Officials hope to complete the nearly $400 million project by 2011.

Port Cranes

The Port of Long Beach recently finished installing four huge new gantry cranes that will make container movement a bit easier.

The cranes, which were delivered in August and installed this month, are 300 feet tall and can reach 170 feet across a ship.

The port, which has roughly 70 cranes, said the new ones will help with the loading and unloading of a new generation of massive cargo ships that stand as much as 150 feet above the water.

SSA Marine Inc., a Seattle-based company that jointly operates several terminals in Long Beach, shipped the cranes from Shanghai.

Two of the cranes were installed in Pier A and two in Pier J.

LNG Moving Forward

The City of Los Angeles and the U.S. Coast Guard this month said an application for a liquefied natural gas project near Los Angeles is complete, clearing the way for an environmental assessment. The OceanWay project would be built 28 miles off the coast of Los Angeles by Woodside Natural Gas Inc., a U.S. subsidiary of Perth, Australia-based Woodside Petroleum Ltd. The company first submitted its proposal in August 2006. The project consists of a system of buoys that would connect to an existing natural gas network through undersea pipelines.

Staff reporter Richard Clough can be reached at (323) 549-5225, ext. 251, or at [email protected].