Friday, February 9, 2007FAA says state must recommend only one Peotone plan(Crain’s) — The Federal Aviation Administration is balking at an Illinois request to review two competing plans for a new south suburban airport near Peotone, saying the state must recommend only one proposal. “We don’t consider the master planning process complete until the sponsor identifies its recommended airport layout plan,” says an FAA spokesman. “We normally receive just one.” That puts the onus back on the state to resolve the difficult political issues over the airport’s governance, which have set the project back in recent years. The Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) on Friday submitted an airport plan it developed for the proposed 20,000-acre airport in eastern Will County, as well as one developed by the Abraham Lincoln National Airport Commission (ALNAC), a local airport authority aligned with Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., D-Chicago, a longtime advocate of building a south suburban airport. IDOT’s proposal is favored by Will County officials, who in recent years have fought ALNAC for the right to control how the airport in their jurisdiction is built and governed. Do you have an opinion about this story? Share it with other readers in our CAA Discussion Forums http://www.californiaaviation.org/dcfp/dcboard.php ***************************************** |