Bagatz Decision on Petition is postponed while the Disinformation by the Municipality continues

Yesterday, June 6th, the Supreme Court held a hearing on the Modiin Municipality demand to amend the Ben Gurion TAMA due to the addition of the flight path over Modiin. The purpose of this demand is to pose strict limitations on the use of the landing path over Modiin after the works on the runways are over (expected September 2013). A detailed report of the court proceedings is available here (in Hebrew).

After hearing both sides the court decided to postpone decision on the matter pending review. This means that there is no timetable for a court decision, and a decision can take weeks or months. There is no urgency as the decision pertains to the use of the landing path over Modiin after the runway works in Ben Gurion Airport are completed, some two years from now.

Prior to the Supreme court hearing the Modiin Municipality distributed a press release which addressed the end of the works of runway 26, on which we reported in detail last weekend. This press release is another brick in the wall of the disinformation spread by the Modiin Municipality headed by Bibas.

Clear Skies analyzed this press release and it found that except two sentences, all of the sentences in the Modiin Municipality press release contain disinformation/are misleading. Our analysis of the Modiin Municipality press release is available here (in Hebrew).

What the Modiin Municipality “forgot” to tell us

On Monday next week, June 6th at 9AM, the Supreme Court in Jerusalem will conduct a follow up session to discuss the Modiin Municipality petition regarding the flights. The previous session was held some seven months ago, on November 1st 2010, in which the Supreme court instructed the State to submit a written response to address several claims made by the Modiin Municipality.

The intensive use of the landing path over Modiin is scheduled to end on September 2011, when runway 26 will be reopened after the works on it are completed. The contractor doing the work on the runways is entitled according to his contract to a bonus if he finishes the work early, and will be required to pay a fine if he is late. Runway 30 on which the flights from Modiin are landing on will be then closed down for works for a period of two years, during which there will be no flights over Modiin.

Clear Skies has recently obtained the document of the State’s answer to Bagatz which was submitted over three months ago. We are publishing to the public this document and the important findings included within it.

An analysis of the State’s answer to Bagatz reveals some very interesting facts, which the Modiin Municipality as usual did not share with the public.

These findings include:

1. The State’s answer makes it vividly clear that the main reason for the decline in the flights over the city during the winter months was due to the seasonal decline in the demand for long distance flights. Ever since Passover we are experiencing a significant increase in the number of flights over Modiin, and this number is expected to peak during the summer, the high season of tourism. Only two months ago the Modiin Municipality unabashedly claimed that the reason for the decline of the number of flights over the city was supposedly due to its relentless legal efforts…
2. The State’s answer reveals how careless the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) was when it decided that flights will take off on runway 30 towards the east. The breadth of the CAA safety study was to ask the airlines if they think they will be OK with it. The airlines said “no problem”, but after runway 26 was closed down and planes began to take off on runway 30 to the east, the airlines said that the heavy planes (for long distance flights with a lot of fuel, people & cargo) are at risk of crashing on the mountains east of Ben Gurion Airport, unless the plane load is lightened. Regarding lightening the load, the airlines argued that in such a case it would not be economical for them to operate these flights. The CAA accepted the airlines position, and that is how the landing of flights over Modiin at night came about.
3. The State’s answer reveals that despite all the hype at the time, Minister  of the Defense of the Environment Gilad Erdan did not issue a warrant forbidding the flights which generate over 75 decibel noise levels.  The State’s response states that this because in the eyes of the Ministry of Defense of Environment this is not considered excessive noise, and that because contrary to the claims made by the Modiin Municipality, the regulations which govern noise hazards do not apply to noise made by planes.
4. The State claims that the Airport Authority is handing flights which generate over 75 decibels as exceptions, but the reality is that Airport Authority does not even threaten the airlines with a fine or any other sanctions, and the head of the CAA Giora Rom states clearly that it is not feasible not to have some of the flights over Modiin exceeding the 75 decibels noise levels.
5. The State makes it clear that contrary to the Municipality’s claim there is no need to update the Ben Gurion Airport Area plan (TAMA) in order to include the landing path over Modiin, since the TAMA is not updated every time a landing path is changed, and since the TAMA for Ben Gurion Airport only refers to the areas which experience over 60 decibel average - while the noise levels experienced in Modiin due the flights are well below this threshold.
6. The State’s answer reveals that the Aviation Authorities adamantly refuse to give up the use of the landing path over Modiin even after the works on the runway will be completed, and they emphasize its importance in the future too. The Aviation Authorities also adamantly refuse to impose any limitations on their future use of the landing path over Modiin.
7. The State’s answer includes a reprimand of the Modiin Municipality for its personal attacks included within their legal briefs on the State Attorney, in which the Modiin Municipality attorneys accused the State Attorney of lack of integrity and used language that was deemed as befitting internet talkbacks, not court legal briefs.

For a more detailed analysis, including access to the State’s entire response, please see the post on the Clear Skies Hebrew website.

Modiin Municipality’s request for court order to cease the night flights was rejected again by Bagatz

Modiin-Watch unveiled this week that the Modiin Municipality submitted on December 8th an additional request to Bagatz to issue a court order to cease the night flights, and that Bagatz once again rejected this request over a week ago, just like it rejected last August the Modiin Municipality’s first request for a court order.

From the wording of the Bagatz decision it seems as if the Modiin Municipality attempted to use the strike of the State’s attorneys to its advantage.

The end of December will mark six months to the flights over Modiin, and our impression is that Bagatz is not persuaded by the arguments presented by the Modiin Municipality and that Bagatz does not intend to issue a court order to forbid the flights.

The repeated refusal of Bagatz to take any practical steps to stop the night flights is in sharp contrast to the Modiin Municipality’s claims that Bagatz supposedly accepted all its claims.

On a more positive note, it appears that the work on the runways is proceeding faster than planned, and the next phase of the work which will involve closing down runway 30 used for the flights over Modiin may take place as early as July 2011, instead of the end of 2011 as originally projected.

The Modiin Municipality hid from the public the fact that it issued an additional request for a court order and that this request was rejected, and it issued a press release only after this fact was unveiled by Modiin-Watch. The Modiin Municipality also unabashedly claimed that the progress on the runway works is thanks to its legal efforts with  Bagatz, while the truth of the matter is that this progress is due to the large financial bonuses for early completion that the Airport Authority placed as part of its contracts with its contractors – contracts that were negotiated and signed long before the planes started flying over Modiin.

For more information please see the post on our Hebrew Website.

Latest Developments regarding Minister Gilad Erdan’s involvement regardin the Flights

In light of recent developments described in detail in the post on our Hebrew website, the demonstration which we planned to pressure minister Erdan this Friday is cancelled.

We will update this post by tomorrow to provide a summary in English of these latest developments, so please check back again.

The State's response to Bagatz re the flights over Modi'in raises disturbing questions

Last week the Supreme Court rejected Modi'in Municipality request to issue a temporary court injunction to forbid the night flights over the city. The court decided so after it received the State's response to the Modi'in Municipality petition, and given the Court's ruling, it appears that the Court found the State's answer to be more persuasive.

The impact of this decision is that the flight will continue over our heads for many more months, until the legal process is concluded. The date for the first hearing in the Supreme Court has been set for October 11^th, 2010 at 9am. The discussion is open to the public.

Clear Skies obtained and reviewed the State's complete response to the Modi'in Municipality petition. We found several interesting points in the State's response to Bagatz:

1. It turns out that the Modi'in Municipality misled the public when it announced on July 5th that it first heard about the need to open a window for night flights only July 1st. The State's response discloses on p. 9 that the Modi'in Municipality was fully briefed on June 13^th about the need to open a night flights window.

2. The new LDA landing path over Modi'in went into effect only on July 1^st, and hence the Municipality had a window of opportunity to appeal against it before it became operational. Yet for some peculiar reason, the Municipality chose to do nothing, as well as to hide this information from the public.

3. The Municipality submitted its petition to Bagatz only on July 21^st, a month and half after it first learned about the need for night flights, and 3.5 months after the decision published by the CAA (April 6^th) on the landing path over the heart of the city.

4. This delay significantly hinders the chance of success of the petition, as is outlined in detail in pages 17-18 of the State's answer to Bagatz.

5. The State argues (in page 9) that the reason it needed to open the night flight window is because the Airlines said that the long distance flight, which are large planes carrying heavy cargo and fuel, cannot take off safely on runway 12 (to the East) due to the risk of collision with a mountain. They said that they would have to ship the cargo separately, thus it would not make it economical. Ergo, the argument for routing flights over Modi'in is rooted in the airline's profitability and not in safety considerations per se.

6. It's interesting to note that the Mayor of Holon, Moti Sasson, appealed to Bagatz in May against the State's decision to open a flight window over his city. Mayor Sasson's first request to issue a temporary injunction was rejected by the Supreme Court, but Mayor Sasson did not give up, and submitted a second request, and this time Bagatz issued a temporary injunction forbidding night flights over Holon due to commercial reasons, and allowing only flights due to safety reasons.

7. Thus Clear Skies calls upon Modi'in Mayor to follow Holon Mayor's precedence, and to issue immediately another amended request for a temporary injunction, rather than to wait for the court hearings and to have the residents of Modi'in continue to endure the noise of the night flights for many more months.

8. Clear Skies also learned from city council member Danny Rosenfeld that Egypt recently introduced a sanction forbidding Israeli planes to fly over the area of Taba in their instrument landing approach to Eilat airport. According to Rosenfeld, the CAA approved the use of a visual landing path to Eilat at night, despite challenging terrain. The CAA refused to allow a visual/RNAV (instrument landing system) at night over Ben Shemen forest, and insisted that all planes landing at Ben Gurion runway 30 at night be routed via the LDA path over Modi'in – and the result is the noise we hear at night.

9. Thus Clear Skies calls upon Mayor Bibas to challenge the CAA decision and to explain why it allows visual landings over Eilat at night, but not over Ben Shemen forest.

10. The State's response to Bagatz includes a detailed report of the flights over Modiin in July – the same report that city council Danny Rosenfeld requested in his proposal to city council meeting of July 14^th that the Modiin Municipality publish to the public every month. Yet Mayor Bibas adamantly refused, and all of the city council members (except Alex Weinreb and Yitzhaki Hen) abided by Bibas's directive and rejected Rosenfeld's proposal.

11. The flight report confirms that there are indeed very high noise levels, and there are quite a few flights that exceed the 75dB levels.

12. Yet the Ministry of Defense of the Environment went out of its way in its statement submitted to the Supreme court to claim that the noise levels are not severe, basing their report on the first 12 days of July. The State claims (in p. 10 of its response) that the data for the rest of July, which included noisier days, was not handed at the time to the Ministry of Environment.

Clear Skies' conclusion is that the central government is adamant on implementing the landing path over Modi'in and that the Likud party, whose ministers are in charge of the Transportation Office (minister Yisrael Katz) as well as the Environment Protection Office (minister Gilad Erdan), are instruments in carrying out the State's plan.

The fact that Mayor Haim Bibas is an ambitious Likud member who strives to move on from Modi'in to national politics turned out to be a disadvantage, as we believe that if the ruling party was say Kadima, then Bibas would take off the gloves and fight this decision with full force – something that we think he did not wish to do given his close ties with his patron, Likud Leader PM Binyamin Netanyahu.

The result is that the residents of Modi'in got the short end of the stick, and we will need to suffer the noise of the flights for the next 15-18 months until the work on runway 26 is completed.

Clear Skies activist Ezi Shabi took still camera shots of the night flights from Emek Ha'Ela Blvd. (Tsipor/Cramim neighborhood) during the 90 minute night flight window and you can see the trail of the planes flying to the West. It's interesting to note that instead of doing the full approach over the heart of the city, a few of the planes can been seen making "shortcut" over Kaiser/Avnei Hen and joining in from the left in Ezi's beautiful photo. You can also see in the photo the stripes from the stars due to the Earth rotation.

For more details please see the post on our Hebrew website.

The Municipality filed its petition to Bagatz against the flights

On Wednesday this week, July 21st, the Modiin Municipality filed its petition to Bagatz against the flights. The petition was filed against the Israeli government, in particular the offices of Interior, Environmental Protection, Transportation and the Aviation Authorities. Bagatz instructed the government offices to submit an initial response within 14 days, and will schedule a hearing after the court recess.

The Modiin Municipality petition focuses on a demand to the ministry of interior to conduct the due process to change the national outline plan (תמ”א) which does not include the new LDA landing path over Modiin, so that Modiin Municipality is afforded the chance to present its arguments and to demand compensation for the introduction of a new flight path over the city which damages the quality of life of its residents. It should be emphasized that this process will not stop the flights over the city.

This petition has been expanded by a demand to Bagatz to issue an intermediate injunction to prevent the night flights on the grounds of statements issued to Bagatz by the Aviation Authorities over a year ago. The petition also demands that Bagatz issue a ruling that after the runway works in Ben Gurion Airport are concluded (expected in 3.5 years) that the LDA landing path over Modiin will be declared null and void.

As explained in an earlier post, the problem is that Modiin Municipality erased its petition in June 2009, and thus it is essentially relying on a dead process, that was succeeded by a new process with totally different parameters, that resulted with the CAA decision issued in April 2010.

The Modiin Municipality embraced the CAA decision document, overlooking the fact that there was no mention of the hours which this landing path will be used. The petition also does not address the claims by the CAA that the night flights are required for long range flights with heavy cargo who need the longer runway 30.

The Modiin Municipality petition is so desperate that it even references quotes from Joshua book chapter six about how the city of Jericho was brought down with the shofar, in order to claim that it is analogous to the noise from which Modiin residents are suffering.

Council Member Danny Rosenfeld issued a sharp letter to Mayor Bibas in which he pointed out the discrepancies the petition submitted and between Mayor Bibas declarations to city council last week about the petition being against the new landing path and not just against the night flights, and protested the fact that the mayor did not even send a copy of the petition to city council members.. Council member Rosenfeld demanded that mayor Bibas modify the petition so that it is compatible with his statements to city council.

We hope that the petition is successful , although at this time it seems that it will require nothing short of the miracle that brought down the walls of Jericho…

For more details please see our post on our Hebrew website.

The Municipality to Petition the Supreme Court against the Night Flights – but its Chances Appear Slim

On Monday this week the Municipality issued the following press release (translation to English courtesy of Modiinfo):

Municipality to Petition the High Court Against the Night-time Landing Path

The city's management met last night (Monday) in order to discuss the latest developments regarding the nighttime flights over the city.

During the discussion, it was agreed that the city cannot function properly with the noise disturbances caused by the planes and the disruption of the residents' quality of life. It was therefore decided to petition the High Court against the nighttime landing route above the city.

The route is a blatant violation of the entire process that began when the Civil Aviation Authority and the Israel Airports Authority declared in front of the High Court that "the procession will run only during the afternoon hours, depending on the direction of the wind. We are only speaking about approximately 30 landings on weekdays, and around 20 on weekends. The procession is only temporary until Route 30 is renewed, planned, and implemented."

The municipality will hire the services of the former head of the CAA, a pilot and Israeli aviation expert, Neri Yarkoni, esq. In the past, Yarkoni has represented a number of authorities against the CAA and the IAA, and today leads the Holon area against a night-time flight plan similar to the one affecting Modiin.

Yarkoni will join the Municipality Legal Advisor, Dana Chafetz-Tokler, Esq, Einav Livna, Esq, from the Legal Department, and Ayal Mamo, Esq. and Avi Portman, Esq. from Agmon Attorneys.

The basis for the petition as stated above are statements made by the aviation authorities to Bagatz well over a year ago. The problem is that Modiin Municipality erased its petition in June 2009, and thus it is essentially relying on a dead process, that was succeeded by a new process with totally different parameters.

Following the resident protests organized by Clear Skies in July 2009, the municipality and the CAA entered into a new process, in which the CAA evaluated the Modiin Municipality’s proposed landing path. This process culminated in the CAA decision published last April, which included a reduced forecast of 5-10 flights expected to fly over Modiin, but on the other hand the CAA decision did not include even a single word about any restrictions on what hours flights will take place over Modiin.

Instead of appealing to Bagatz against the CAA decision as Clear Skies proposed, the Modiin Municipality embraced the CAA decision document, overlooking the fact that there was no mention of the hours which this landing path will be used. The Modiin Mayor Haim Bibas put his faith in the forecast cited in the CAA document and in the trust relations with head of CAA, Giora Rom.

Thus Clear Skies believes that the appeal to Bagatz has very slim chances of success, and that it is mostly aimed to convey to Modiin residents that its Municipality is doing everything it can to stop the night flights that are disturbing the sleep of its residents.

We sincerely hope that the Municipality’s legal team has some tricks up their sleeves that they are not sharing with us, and that our assessment above will ultimately be proven wrong.

For more details see the post on our Hebrew Website.

The CAA: Oops, Our Forecast was Wrong…

The new LDA landing path over Modiin started operating on July 1st 2010, and ever since then Modiin residents have been suffering from noisy flights every night. Click here to watch a short video filmed by Clear Skies activist Ezi Shabi of these night flights over Cramim neighborhood (Tsipor).

Last Thursday the CAA informed Modiin Municipality that they are forced to open landing window between 11:30PM and 01:00AM for long range flights who carry heavier loads and require the longer runway 30. While the LDA landing path over Modiin is considered by the aviation authorities as the last priority during the day, it is considered by the aviation authorities as the only option during the night for flights landing on runway 30.

BTW, the experienced airline captain who consulted Clear Skies and the Municipality stated that flights can land over Ben Shemen forest (instead of over Modiin) also at night when good weather conditions exist, but the CAA rejected his opinion.

As result of the night flights Bibas sent an angry letter to the head of CAA, Giora Rom, claiming that the agreements between the sides were breached and threatened to appeal to Bagatz.

The aviation authorities responded that there was never any agreement between the aviation authorities and the Modiin Municipality - and they are correct. The CAA decision was a one sided document, which Modiin Municipality did not even receive a draft in advance to provide its comments and feedback – and the Modiin Municipality certainly is not a party to any agreement. The CAA worded its decision very carefully and provided what it termed as a “forecast” of 5-10 planes daily that would pass Modiin. In the CAA decision document there is no restriction regarding night flights.

It is precisely because that a “forecast” is such a nonbinding term and because there is no legal binding agreement between the the CAA and Modiin Municipality that Clear Skies pushed to appeal to Bagatz, in order to set clear restrictions to the use of the LDA landing path, and to set sanctions in case these restrictions are violated.

However mayor Bibas ignored all the warnings by Clear Skies and by council members Danny Rosenfeld and Alex Weinreb, and rejected our appeals to go to Bagatz, stating that he has complete faith in Giora Rom, head of the CAA. Bibas persuaded the great majority of the city council members to support his position, relying on these forecasts and presenting them as agreements. Mayor Bibas and the city council members ignored the hundreds of emails sent by Modiin residents responding to our request, urging the mayor and the council members to continue to struggle for clear skies.

Now we are all paying the price of Bibas’s gullibility, vanity and inability to heed others’ advise. 

The main obstacle to go to Bagatz now against a decision made by the CAA in April is that the supreme court rejects appeals that are not made in short proximity to the decision. Thus an appeal submitted by Modiin Municipality in July-August against a decision published in April may be rejected out of hand by the supreme court due to “shihuy” (delay).

We still hope that it is not to late to go to Bagatz, but the likelihood is that our quality of life will be significantly compromised over the next year and a half, and perhaps even longer.

For more information please see the detailed post in our Hebrew website.

Clear Skies Recap and New Revelations

During the past week there were a couple of days with flights over Modiin that were quite noisy. These flights were using the old VOR landing path that has been used on occasion during poor weather conditions, when the alternate eastern runway 26 could not be used. The VOR landing path is being used recently more than before, because the alternate eastern landing path was shut down in the beginning of June for overhaul for a period that is planned to span a year and a half, leaving runway 12-30 as the only operating runway in Ben Gurion Airport during this period.

The new LDA landing path for runway 30 that goes over Modiin will go into effect only on July 1st, and it is estimated that it will be noisier than the VOR landing path, as its altitude over Modiin is 600-1,200 feet lower than that of the VOR landing path. The new LDA landing path instructs pilots to lower the landing gear only after the plane has cleared Modiin, a measure intended to reduce the noise to Modiin residents.

Modiin municipality has setup a committee headed by deputy mayor Hanan Bernstein, that will monitor the flights over Modiin, compare it to the 5-10 flights/day average forecast provided by the aviation authorities, and discuss any irregularities with the aviation authorities. You are welcome to report flights with landing gear down over Modiin, excessive noise levels, etc. to deputy mayor Hanan Bernstein at hanan_b@modiin.muni.il.

Last week we received a complaint from a Modiin resident who arrived per our invitation at the City Council meeting on June 2nd, to witness the discussion and the vote that took place on the Clear Skies initiative to appeal to Bagatz against the proposed landing path, and to use the Supreme Court to turn the so called “forecast” into a binding legal agreement that would include sanctions in case of violations (a proposal that was rejected by city council). It turns out that the Modiin Municipality locked the doors to the meeting immediately after it began, and refused to let residents in, under the pretext that the meeting room was full. Thus the resident left the place frustrated, like other residents who were not admitted to the meeting room.

The truth is that the meeting room was far from full and it had accommodated more than 20 additional people in previous meetings that I have attended there, such as this council meeting. In the 3 years that I have been attending city council meetings I have not seen a precedence to this behavior.  Also, in the morning of the city council meeting we explicitly wrote the general manager of the municipality and asked that measures be taken to assure that every resident who wants to view the meeting will be able to do so. We suggested holding the meeting elsewhere if needed (for example, the first council meeting after the elections was held at the entrance to the municipality to accommodate the crowd). We filed a formal complaint to the Interior Ministry. The local news site mcity also wrote about this incident, stating that it should signal a red warning light regarding the municipality behavior.

Last week I was interviewed by the local newspaper “Hadashot Modiin”, in which the nature of the pressures applied on Clear Skies activists were revealed for the first time. For example, one clear skies activist (who is a most credible person) reported that he received a telephone call from Sharon Maoz (Haim Bibas’s protégé), who told the activist that Bibas is enraged at the Clear Skies email updates that were critical of the municipality, and that Bibas wants to shut down Clear Skies. Sharon Maoz proceeded to tell the activist that “this isn’t a threat, but” Bibas & him need to know if that activist is continuing with Clear Skies, because if there will be more emails from Clear Skies then the remaining activists will be sued. More of these nasty tactics are described in the post titled “The internet troll who wanted to be a city council member”.

The interview also contains an analysis of the schedule of the Ben Gurion runway overhaul project, and how this schedule perfectly coincides with the schedule for the municipal elections due for November 2013. This may provide rationale for the surprising turnaround of mayor Bibas regarding the struggle for Clear Skies, in addition to Bibas’s conflict of interest betwen his loyalty to Modiin residents and his dependence on and loyalty to his Likud party leader Binyamin Netanyahu.

The interview is available on the Hadashot Modiin website, and an expanded version is available on Modiin-Watch, including a reprint of the Yediot Ahronot article on the Ben Gurion runway overhaul project schedule.

A year ago, a group of Modiin volunteer residents heeded the call of the Modiin mayor who asked us to lead a public struggle against the planned landing path, in order to provide the public backing to the municipality in its dealings with the aviation authorities and with the ministry of transportation. A few months ago the Modiin mayor has drastically changed his position on the struggle for Clear Skies. Differences of opinion are of course legitimate, however we suddenly found ourselves the target of pressures, intimidations & threats by the Modiin Municipality and its messengers, and that is totally unthinkable.

Thank you to all of you who cooperated with our calls for action, especially to those who attended the protests during the heat of July. Thank you to those of you who generously donated to help finance Clear Skies activities.

Yours truly,

Yaki Beja, Eli Gal & Ezi Shabi -the Clear Skies Activists left standing all the way to the very end.

Fore more details see the Hebrew version of this post on our Hebrew Website.