Taylor: We have a choice at the Federal Aviation Administration

We see letters from the same group of people to the airport. They obviously speak for Pitkin County, as many are on county councils and all are promoting major projects.

The latest “party line” seems to be that the public (represented by Aspen Fly Right and CABP) is somehow “playing coward” with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). This is an interesting phrasing considering that the last time the FAA tried to force Pitkin County to comply with a standard that negates our situation, the BOCC (of old) took a clear line for community standards.

It is not a “coward’s game” to tell the FAA that we want them to do their job of ensuring safety and access to our airport. They will continue to fund us with all the grants we are entitled to (the BOCC is now (temporarily?) awarding millions of FAA grants (from ASE) to Colorado Springs); these are basically public funds. Their job is to ensure safety… and we are… safe.

The FAA should not dictate how we should develop our valley, how many passengers we should carry, or what size airport we need to squeeze into our narrow canyon with a shared runway, high altitude air, and unexpected winds.

The FAA also has no practice of giving airports a lower classification than the one they have held for about 50 years, and has stated this before.

Several people have suggested that people looking for “reliable” information about the airport should visit the airport’s website. That’s where all the propaganda for the expansion can be found, written in a way that makes the public believe we have “no other choice.”

We have a choice.

Instead of presenting all sides to the public, the BOCC has refused to present the options or give citizens a chance to voice their opinion (vote). Instead, they have decided that five people should order the spending of well over $100 million on our largest county asset. They could have put this to a vote, but they are forcing their constituents to do so as well – at the expense of the citizens.

We all agree that we need to “modernize” the airport and make traveling to Aspen a pleasant experience. Not all of us use “modernization” and “expansion” interchangeably.

It seems that this can only be attributed to the proponents of enlargement.

Susan Taylor

Woody Creek