Agreement Reached with Tour Operators!
People from all over the world are drawn to the Sedona area to experience its natural beauty. Visitors and residents love to explore the many hiking trails in the Coconino National Forest and are particularly impressed with the Wilderness Areas located in the forest. One key part of that experience is the opportunity for quiet exploration of the area. As the Forest Service has noted – “natural quiet is a value inherent to National Forest lands.”
As Sedona grew in tourism so did helicopter tours of the area. Even is 1998 the impact of helicopter tours was pronounced. The Forest Service noted: “Aircraft noise impacts on the Sedona area’s National Forest lands long ago surpassed the benign level, particularly when helicopter tour operations were added in the late 1980s.”
KSB has been active in addressing noise issues for many years. In 2000, at the request of the Sedona Airport Authority, KSB formed a community committee to investigate what might be done. This became the Sedona (Citizens) Noise Abatement Committee (SNAC). These efforts led to the enactment of a Noise Abatement Protocol at the airport which sought voluntary adherence to FAA and airport recommendations to fly at least 2000 feet above ground level when conducting tours in the Sedona area.
In 2015 the issue of noise re-surfaced. Disturbances of wilderness and forest hiking areas increased. Pilots also refused to abide by the FAA Advisory and were conducting tours very near renowned rock formations and heritage sites. Moreover, the airport Master Plan projected that the number of helicopter flights would double to 20,000 in 15 years.
As a result, KSB approached the City of Sedona and formed a Citizen’s Engagement Group that workes with the city, county (owner of the airport), airport authority, Forest Service, and others to find ways to improve this situation.
After five years of work, an agreement was reached with the two local tour operators, Guidance Air and Sedona Air Tours. It establishes voluntary “No-Fly Zones” and minimum altitudes, resulting in less noise pollution.
Our collaborative effort paid off with this historic voluntary agreement, one of the first of its kind in the country. You can read more about this agreement at (SedonaAirNoise.com) on the Sedona Chamber of Commerce website.
If you experience excessive airport noise or believe that a tour operator has violated the voluntary agreement, you can report this to the Sedona Oak-Creek Airport Authority at: https://sedonaairport.org/noise-abatement