CITY NEWS

February 28, 2024

Follow-Up From Feb 20th Camarillo Airport Layout Plan Community Meeting

The City of Camarillo is committed to keeping our community informed.

You are being included on this email because you signed up

to receive City News on the Camarillo Airport Layout Plan.

In case you missed the February 20th Camarillo Airport Layout Plan Community Meeting, here is a video recording shared by the Ventura County Department of Airports, via the VC Airports YouTube channel:

https://youtu.be/EGqwFIogfm4

From The Ventura County Department of Airports:

One question posed to the panel was regarding noise level readings, particularly any readings above 90 dBA. We understand the charts/graphs that we have presented can be confusing. We also recognize that we did not clearly address the question during the meeting and instead may have made it even more confusing. We’d like to provide some clarification.

The question referred to “90 dBA” that is established in the Joint Powers Agreement (1976 JPA) and that in our own reports there are many instances where aircraft appear to exceed the 1976 JPA limit. The dBA scale is used for multiple purposes and appears in the Part 150 report for both Sound Exposure Level (SEL) as well as for the Maximum Level (Lmax). Both values are presented in Table F3 | Noise Measurement Single Event Data Summary (shown below).  

From The Ventura County Department of Airports:

The 1976 JPA refers to “90 dBA single event noise,” and reads as follows:

Airport development shall be guided to ensure that residential areas are not exposed to noise levels greater than 60 CNEL average noise and 90 dBA single event noise.

Single events are expressed using Lmax, which can be heard by the human ear. Lmax is shown in the 2^nd column in Table F3 above. Table A (shown below) provides the highest Lmax readings recorded at each of the eight measurement sites. All of the readings shown in Table A are the top 31 recorded loudest aircraft events of the more than 3,100 aircraft events captured during our four months of onsite noise monitoring sampling. Only one site registered an Lmax reading above 90 dBA, which was caused by a vintage military jet. These readings are consistent with the noise contours for individual aircraft types that predict the 90 dBA contour only reaches areas within or very near the airport boundary.

From The Ventura County Department of Airports:

We understand that some of our neighbors have expressed that they have experienced readings at or above 90 dBA from personal noise monitor devices. Because this is an ongoing concern, we’d like to reiterate that Airports staff will continue to visit nearby neighborhoods on various days/times to conduct readings. We will also continue to explore the feasibility of methods for capturing current and future aircraft noise readings.

We hope this helps provide much needed clarification. Please check our website and or our next email notification regarding the forthcoming Noise Study public meeting/listening session expected in the May/June timeframe.