South Boston Heliport

P

PaulC

Senior Member
Joined
May 27, 2006
Messages
1,617
Reaction score
0
Anyone know anything about this?

Heliport

It?s time we restore the integrity of the community process and reinvolve the public in discussions about their neighborhoods, and their quality of life. While this particular issue may be focused on South Boston this time, it is only the latest example of the BRA steamrolling through neighborhoods with agendas that cater to special interests and exclude valuable community input. I am asking city officials to help me understand the tangible benefits that the city will gain from a South Boston heliport. Join me and find out at a community meeting on Monday, June 9th, at 6:30 p.m. at the Condon School (200 D Street).


Maintaining Boston?s excellence begins with creating sustainable communities that foster growth and protect neighborhood character at the same time. Families leave when neighborhood planning and development are done in a vacuum and when city officials do not look at the big picture or consider the best interests of all Boston residents and businesses, both big and small.


While we should continue to be open-minded to new business ventures, South Boston - or any Boston neighborhood - should not be the ?catch-all? community whenever a new special interest comes to town, especially when they do not mesh with that community?s goals and values.


The only special interests should be the public?s interests. Instead of rolling out the red carpet for the wealthy and elite, we should be rolling out the welcome mat for all Bostonians.


Join me on Monday, June 9th, at 6:30 p.m. at the Condon School to openly discuss the community impact of a South Boston heliport. I look forward to seeing you and listening to your concerns.
Click to expand...

http://www.southbostoninfo.com/mainstorie.html#anchor175908
 
Boston Heliport Operator RFP Released

After many years of lobbying and promoting a public heliport for the city of Boston, the New England Helicopter Council is excited to see one proposed for the near horizon.

Boston's Economic Development and Industrial Corporation (EDIC) and the Massachusett's Aeronautics Commission (MAC) have joined efforts to release a request for proposal (RFP) for an operator to build and operate a south Boston Vertiport/Heliport in the Marine Industrial Park.

The location provided by the city is a 41,901 parcel located at 1 Terminal Avenue. It was selected due to previous use of this site by law enforcement personnel and an over water route structure which would provide the lowest noise signature profile.

The goal is for the site to be privately run, but be a public use heliport with 24 hour fuel service, parking and availability to accommodate large aircraft, such as the Bell 609 Tilt rotor and the Sikorsky S-92.

NEHC would like to thank both MAC and EDIC, and the city of Boston for their support of this project and encourage interested parties to participate in the bid. The Thursday, Nov. 1, 2007 due date has been changed to Thursday, December 13, 2007. Bids should be sent directly to the EDIC. Details can be found on the Massachusetts Comm-Pass website:


www.comm-pass.com

For any questions concerning this RFP, please contact Maura Hendricks of EDIC at 617-918-4336.

http://www.nehc.org/BostonHeliport.html
 
I live a stones throw from th 34th St Heleport in NY and I can attest to how much they suck for people living nearby. The are loud as hell and the fumes are deadly.
 
I'd tend to side with the NIMBYs on this one. Why do we need a heliport in that location? I see no hospitals nearby.
 
This isn't all that close to any residential neighborhoods, at least none of considerable value. Besides, the two most likely frequent flight paths would be to the east to Logan and northwest to Hanscom. The service that US Helicopter provides in NY from JFK/Newark to Manhattan could definitely be emulated shuttling higher end travellers between the convention center area hotels and Logan and Hanscom.

http://www.flyush.com/index.shtml
 
Water taxis already work fine getting people from the South Boston Piers to the airport.
 
For some perhaps, but there are always people willing to pay more for better. While I've never taken the water taxi, it seems to have little going for it relative to the current best option of a sedan or cab. You still have to hop on a shuttle bus to the terminals and go through security at the airport, whereas here one passes through security before they board the chopper and they are delivered to the tarmac where they may enter the terminal straight away. With Logan that would be less than a 20 minute process versus probably an hour for the water taxi, heliport/dock to gate.
 
That location is nowhere near anything residential. if someone thinks there's a reason to have it there, who are we to complain?
 
it seems to have little going for it relative to the current best option of a sedan or cab.
Click to expand...

So by the time you schlepp yourself down Summer Street to take a helicopter Logan.. your what, 5 min away, at most anyway? Why not just stay in your cab or sedan, and pay the extra $2 to get dropped off at Logan? The heliports work in NYC because the airports are sufficiently far away geographically, and the traffic is usually awful and unpredictable. Plus there is sufficient volume of people to JFK, Laguardia, Newark, Teterborough, White Plains, etc. Are Hanscom, Norwood, or Cape/Island airports even busy enough to warrant service? Would someone pay for a helicopter to Manchester or Providence so they can catch their Southwest flight to Orlando? Is Logan so far from the BCEC or downtown that we're losing business due to the terrible inconvenience spending 3 minutes in a tunnel?


This isn't all that close to any residential neighborhoods, at least none of considerable value
Click to expand...
And thanks for the constant reminder that your soooo much better than everyone else, and anyone who may live near this site is of little consequence. Imagine if they wanted to plop this down in Fenway, South End, or even the roof of the Pru in the Back Bay? Rome would be burning over this proposal.
 
kmp1284 said:
This isn't all that close to any residential neighborhoods, at least none of considerable value.
Click to expand...

Every residential neighborhood is of considerable value to the people who live in it.
 
Five minutes if you're a statie with flashing lights. Everytime I've driven to Logan it's a solid 15 minutes just from that little opening in the tunnel behind Manulife to the curb at Terminal A. That's not terrible, but then you add in check in, security, general mayhem if you're at the American terminal about 6:30 am and your trip to the gate just took an hour. That's the crux of my argument, the ability to bypass the BS for only about $160 each way. Yes it sounds like a lot but in today's world where a Boston-Heathrow first class ticket can top $15,000 and one just to LA can hit $3,000 it's a drop in the bucket for a lot of people. If they work out a system as in NY to bypass conventional airport security by having it at the heliport and market heavily with a codeshare or interline agreement with a couple big Logan carriers(Delta, Continental, US and American would be most logical) I think it would do alright. Of course it would perform far better from somewhere in the financial district but this would be a worthwhile venture as well.

I'm not saying that I'm better than anyone rather I'm saying what everybody knows, that the residential neighborhoods closest to this area are not the most desirable. They aren't the least either, but let's accept reality that some places just aren't that nice and there's no reason we should be afraid to say that.
 
And the "needs" of people who pay for $15,000 airline tickets outweigh the needs of people on L Street and Second Street for some peace and quiet? (They already have to deal with Logan's noise, and now someone wants to add more?)
 
Actually yes, in my book(the one I borrowed from H. L. Hunt), the needs of the guy who has a $15k plane ticket and the means to back it up outweighs the needs of people who do not have such means. As with our good friend Ned, nobody has a gun to their back forcing them to live there, if they don't like it, they can move.
 
I'm not saying that I'm better than anyone rather I'm saying what everybody knows, that the residential neighborhoods closest to this area are not the most desirable. They aren't the least either, but let's accept reality that some places just aren't that nice and there's no reason we should be afraid to say that.
Click to expand...

What you are saying 'not nice places = not nice people with no right to object' and it's more important that the well to do get their pre-flight champagne and foie-gras at upmost convenience, while the lowly neighbors live with constant whirring of helicopters above their dirty little neighborhood.
 
Just a thought: Putting aside the issue of the proposed location for a moment, is there a market for a scenic helicopter tour of Boston and the surrounding areas? Would tourists pay something like $100 per person for a 30-40 minute aerial tour of Boston and its surrounding areas?

and as for the location, absent an emergency, can't use of the heliport be restricted to 8:00am to 8:00pm or something similar so that at the very least choppers are landing and taking off at all hours of the day?
 
As with our good friend Ned, nobody has a gun to their back forcing them to live there, if they don't like it, they can move.
Click to expand...

so you've established the people who live nearby have no money, no means, no intellect, and no sense of cleanliness, I wonder where they might actually move to, if they were so free as you claim?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top