Mayor "Not Stable"

Craig Johnson, the mayor of Elk Grove Village (IL) thinks Mayor Richard Daley's midnight bulldozing of Meigs Field suggests he is not stable. And so Johnson has told his police department to beef up patrols on the east side of O'Hare. It's the latest development in a story that shocked pilots and aviation enthusiasts nationwide. In the dark of night, without public hearings, without warning, Chicago Mayor Richard Daley early Monday sent city bulldozers to wreck the runway at Meigs Field.

Now, Daley is taking plenty of political heat. "It's bad government and it's a very dangerous exercise of power," said Ald. Joe Moore, 49th Ward.

"Never should have been done in the night. I mean, he should have put it before the people," said David Whitehead.

"He just won by a big margin and he said, I'll do what I want. That's the problem with it," said Tim Stanton.

Others polled said they weren't too worried about the decision to close Meigs. "I'm sure the mayor had good reasons to do what he did," said Ald. Ed Smith, 28th Ward.

"I totally have to agree that we have to be careful especially in this time of war," said Ald. Ray Suarez, 31st Ward.

Outrage From Aviation Community 

General aviation associations, the air traffic controllers union, and even the FAA voiced strong concerns about Daley's tactics.

But perhaps the strongest condemnations come from the Chicago papers. Editorials in the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times attacked Daley for ignoring the democratic process (see below).

Aviation organizations were no less condemnatory.

John Carr of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association said, "Clearly, the mayor didn't think his policy choices could either figuratively or literally withstand the light of day. It's the epitome of arrogance." Ray Gibbons, the president of NATCA's Chicago local, added, "Meigs' closure adds complex and higher volumes of traffic to this area's overburdened, understaffed facilities. At some point in time, the safety of the flying public will be compromised."

FAA Administrator Marion C. Blakey said, "We at the FAA were concerned to learn this morning of the decision to close Meigs Field. Already, we have heard from members of the general aviation community, and we share their concern. Removing any centrally located airport such as Meigs from the system only diminishes capacity and puts added pressure on O'Hare and Midway airports."

What About Those Left Behind?

Sixteen planes still sit at Meigs Field, stuck temporarily by the new, bulldozed X's on the runway.  Within the first day after Mayor Daley destroyed the runway at Merrill C. Meigs Field, fully half of the owners whose aircraft are stranded turned to AOPA for help in escaping Daley's snare.

"What we've got to do now is help those 16 prisoners of Daley's war against Meigs get their aircraft back safely," said AOPA President Phil Boyer. "At this point, there isn't much hope of Meigs reopening."

AOPA has worked with the FAA and the city of Chicago to help spring the imprisoned aircraft. Among other things, AOPA provided aircraft performance data to help FAA determine if the Meigs taxiway could be used safely as a runway.

"FAA has signed off on using the taxiway for departures, with certain stipulations," said Woody Cahall, AOPA's vice president of Aviation Services. "The FAA's Great Lakes Region will hold a meeting on Wednesday morning to work out process and procedures for the stranded aircraft to depart."

Following that meeting, the FAA plans to issue a modified notam that will define a very narrow window during which the aircraft already at Meigs may depart. Airport officials will work with the aircrafts' pilots to figure out what time works best.

"There was also a great deal of confusion earlier today," said Cahall. "But AOPA has now established good working relationships with all the parties involved in the departure process and is ensuring the smooth flow of information."

Condemnation From The Chicago Media

Ken Zorn, Chicago Tribune: At a time when several hundred thousand of our men and women are halfway around the world ostensibly fighting for freedom and democracy, Chicago's mayor treated his citizens to an exercise in autocracy so brazen that it was downright amusing.

A midnight demolition raid on the city's own airport! Operation Tick-Tack-Toe pulled off without warning and under police guard; excavators digging up numerous large X's all in a row down the main runway to render it unusable. By the dawn's early light it was clear that the fitful 55-year history of Merrill C. Meigs Field was over.

"To do this any other way would have been needlessly contentious," the mayor explained at a news conference Monday morning.

The public can be so pesky! Hearings. Compromise proposals. Impact studies. That whole messy governmental process thing that's really just a formality in Chicago these days anyway.

Staff Editorial, Chicago Sun-Times: When Mayor Daley was re-elected Feb. 25 with 78.5 percent of the vote, we praised his "record of effort and accomplishment'' that had "earned the trust of a broad spectrum of this city.'' That record was tarnished and that trust broken late Sunday as, without any advance notice or public discussion, the city vandalized its lakefront jewel, Meigs Field.

The mayor has long opposed the small airport at Meigs. He would like to put a park there. Others--ourselves included--argued that the city had miles of underutilized lakefront park, and that a new park at Meigs would be superfluous and out-of-the-way. Making this issue more complex was that Meigs became a point of longtime dispute between Daley and whatever Republican governor was in Springfield, though just over a year ago it seemed that Daley struck a deal with then-Gov. George Ryan--25 more years of Meigs in return for his support for federal action pushing through expansion at O'Hare Airport. The issue seemed settled, and the new governor, Rod Blagojevich, supported it. Just two weeks ago, the mayor was claiming that the future of Meigs was up to the Federal Aviation Administration.

Then, late Sunday, the years of debate and compromise were mocked when the city sent backhoes to rip up the runway at Meigs while police kept the media away. Even though there was no specific threat, Daley claimed public safety demanded this rash action. That is ludicrous. Closing Meigs does not prevent a terrorist from commandeering a plane and crashing it into a building. What it does is send more private aircraft to already crowded Midway and O'Hare airports while eliminating a unique feature of downtown Chicago.

FMI: www.ohare.com, www.ci.chi.il.us/Mayor