There are helicopters that fly so low the apartment shakes. Lets not mention the ears rattling like a sledgehammer.

It is absolutely outrageous that there seems to be no control on our quality of life.

We came here from europe for peace of mind. Is there any way to take action or better yet sue the people involved?

PLEASE HELP ME.
OR LOS ANGELES DO SOMETHING.

Many of the flights are charter flights for sightseeing purposes and these vehicles fly at low altitudes over the hills to hover over celebrities’ homes. For residents of the hills, this causes an endless barrage of noisy blade-slaps and low frequency vibrations which rattle windows and indeed entire structures. It’s a nightmarish descent into the bowels of of some apocalyptic wasteland. OK, while that’s a strong statement, I still often feel as if I’m living in a M.A.S.H. unit day and night. The flights continue unabated throughout most nights.

I’ve had enough. I’m moving to San Francisco next month. If the city of Los Angeles refuses to deal with this scourge after decades of residents’ complaints, this is one city I can live without.

I work at SNA as an instructor at Sunrise Aviation. It’s a fun place to work, actually. It’s very common to see a wide variety of aircraft in the pattern over there. Recently our Cub, Extra 300, and Pitts S-2B were up there with some helicopters. Later a couple of our Decathlons flying formation patter work joined the fun.

It’s fun watching the R22s do the full down autos, though the scraping seems like it would be tough on the airframe.

I really want to do my rotorcraft add-on, but the price is a bit prohibitive, especially on a CFI’s salary…

FYI: http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TRAVEL/NEWS/06/20/traffic.jam/ lists the U.S. cities with the worst traffic. Los Angeles is #1. Boston is not on the list of cities where people waste a lot of time. It is mentioned as a city where rush hour is much slower than non-rush hour (not nearly as bad in this respect as the California metro areas, however).

Regarding the Boston traffic: Folks who commute from our suburbs do suffer as they try to pile into the center, but we don’t have the kind of widespread misery that extends even to those who are trying to go from suburb to suburb at mid-day. I spent more time stuck in traffic in one week in Los Angeles than I have in the last 52 weeks in Boston (and at least 4X per week, I venture out on the highways to drive to helcopter school in Nashua, New Hampshire (about a 40-mile trip)). I’m surprised that rich people in California don’t charter helicopters more often, like their counterparts in Brazil.

Phil: The Robinson course was worthwhile. Portions could have been a little faster-paced, but I’m glad that I went.

Glad you were able to take advantage of Chuck’s B206 at KFUL. I figured that you might use the MD500 at Western Ops at Rialto for the full-downs, but I was wrong.

What is your opinion of Robertson’s course. Was it worth your time?
Phil

Philip -

I must admit that anyone coming from Boston and talking about traffic or traffic design is really pretty ridiculous. And suggesting that we’re somehow used to god-awful helicopter noise (a.k.a. “ghetto birds”) is insulting.

Helicopters are truly the scourge of Los Angeles. From my house we don’t hear traffic, but we certainly hear an endless stream of clattering helicopters. They violate every custom and form of etiquette and should be banned from urban areas.

And, yes, I am a commercial pilot with IFR, etc. In my case, though, I try and fly quietly for my neighbors.

Philip: I am glad you enjoy flying helicopters, but please don’t make these kind of suggestions again. They’re irritating to the locals. Consider fixing Boston’s traffic design first, perhaps by just getting parking spaces to be “unreserved.”

Thanks

I worked for a county dept of transportation ( http://www.maricopa.gov/assessor/gisPortal/gis_portal.asp ) in the mid-nineties developing geographic information systems, gps coordination of our crews etc…Every now and then one of the planners would start blabberin about the Intelligent Vehicle Highway System and how it would give the public all of the things you mention (routing, coordination, etc…)I ain’t holding my breath for it… At this point, we have ‘electronic message boards’ and ‘freeway cameras’, but no delivery of data to the car, much less tracking of the vehicle, coordination of traffic patterns, routing around incidents, etc… In my opinion, the biggest impass to any solid IVHS implementation will be a resolute american determination to maintain their privacy and not let anybody track their movement, primarily out of fear of some gang-buster local municipality mis-using it to increase their income from traffic fines.

Isn’t something like TrafficGauge.com coming to LA? It was developed in Seattle using realtime data from the Dept. of Transportation cameras. Generally works very well. Only nuisance it’s another item to carry — wish it were a display on a cell phone instead. But I think LA is next for them…