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Mary Grady |
| Photographs by Mary Grady
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The busy brick-and-stone village of Newburyport, Massachusetts,
embraces a scenic waterfront on the wide Merrimack River, close to the
treacherous shoals where the waters empty into the Atlantic Ocean. Its narrow
streets overflow with the seaside ambiance typical of the small towns along
the North-of-Boston coast: historic buildings, upscale shops and restaurants,
white-steepled churches, art galleries. But follow the winding two-lane road
to the east, and the horizon opens up to reveal wide wet expanses of silent
green saltmarshes, striped by blue inlets from the sea. And tucked along the
roadside, about three miles from the village and just before the bridge to
Plum Island proper, is tiny Plum Island Airport — an inconspicuous plot of
grass that has aroused powerful feelings in this small New England place.
The little airport doesn't look like much at first glance. A
shingled office building with a porch overlooks the narrow runway, and nearby
sit a couple of rusty hangars and a couple of dozen tiedowns. Along the
roadside stretches a mowed field used mainly for banner-towing operations. The
view stretches far across the marshes to the south and east, to the beach
cottages of Plum Island, about a mile away. The seagrasses glow in the yellow
light of late afternoon, as a cool breeze off the ocean fills the two orange
windsocks.
There's not a lot to see. Yet if you sit for a while on that porch, with
your feet up on the worn wooden railing, and watch as the sky grows bluer, the
sun sinks lower, the windsocks sag, suddenly you might realize an hour or two
has passed and you're feeling very content. Nothing much has happened — a few
touch-and-goes squeaked past, a trike pilot took off on a pleasure flight, a
Plum Island vacationer stopped by to inquire about scenic rides and stayed to
chat until he was late for dinner. But already the airport has revealed its
secret: Yes, it's plain and simple and slow, but that is precisely its allure.
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The Little farmhouse
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The future of Plum Island Airport has been in question since late last
year. On the far side of the runway is a stand of trees, and beyond those
trees lies the Spencer-Pierce-Little Farm, owned by the Society for the Preservation of New
England Antiquities (SPNEA). The historical society inherited the farm
from the Little family, and along with it got a large chunk of the airport
property, including most of the runway, which was leased to Kathy and Dick
Hordon. Last December, SPNEA told the Hordons, who operate the airport and own
the buildings and part of the land, that the lease they'd held for 30 years
would not be renewed when it expires on December 31, 2000. Without that lease
for the runway, the Hordons would have no choice but to close the airport.
"SPNEA said having an airport so close to their [historic 1690] farmhouse
was a risk," recalls Stephen Lisauskas, who works in the mayor's office in
Newburyport. SPNEA also expressed concerns about liability and insurance, and
a preference to leave the land as open space. "But that airport is an
important part of our economy and our history," says Lisauskas. "People love
it. Generations of people have flown out there. The mayor supports it and the
community supports it. And the airport's risk to that farmhouse is little or
none." When Mayor Lisa Mead heard early this year about the decision to end
the lease, she asked for a meeting with SPNEA officials to see if they would
reconsider. "She had not expected SPNEA to have responded the way they did,
which was 'No,'" Lisauskas told the Newburyport Daily News after that
meeting. "There appears to be nothing further that the city can do."
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Jane McNeal in PJ's variety
store
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Perhaps the city was stymied, but the people were just getting started. The
Daily News cried "Mead's plea for airport is rejected" on page one on
March 8. Within two days, Jane McNeal, the owner of PJ's variety store and
restaurant on Plum Island — and a pilot who learned to fly at the airport 20
years ago — began circulating a petition opposing SPNEA's decision and
expressing public support for keeping the airport open. "It was a done deal,"
said McNeal, of SPNEA's position on the lease, but people didn't seem willing
to accept that. A lot of pilots come into her place for coffee or a sandwich,
and they wanted to do something. "The stories I heard were so heartwarming,"
she said. Everyone seemed to have fond memories of the airport, and they
weren't going to stand silently by and see it close. Soon people were stopping
in not to shop or buy lunch, but just to sign the petition.
Meetings were held, phone calls were made, a group called Friends of Plum
Island Airport was formed, and a web site was started. Letters to the editor poured into
the Daily News: "[The airport] is as much a piece of Newburyport
history as any of the buildings under the SPNEA umbrella." ... "As a young boy
of 6 or 7 years, I used to sit... and watch the airplanes ... Please do not
let these memories vanish." Many supporters noted the historic nature of the
airport itself, which has been in operation since the 1930s, making it one of
the oldest airports in New England. SPNEA was criticized for hypocrisy, and
for making decisions without considering the wishes of the community. Business
people chimed in that they needed the airport, too, and it became clear the
airport's constituency spread far beyond a handful of pilots.
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On the ramp at Plum Island
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Where did all this pro-airport sentiment come from? "Kathy and Dick Hordon
have done a lot of things right, for many years encouraging frequent public
use of the airport," Glenn Greenhalgh, of Air News New England, wrote
in an editorial last summer. Kathy Hordon agrees: "This huge outcry of support
— there would not be this response if it weren't for the way the airport has
been run for the past 35 years... We invite the community in all the time."
The Lions Club holds a horse show there; the Boy Scouts, synagogues and
high-school graduation classes all host events on the field, and the Hordons
offer use of the site for free. Most summers they organize fly-ins, and every
year they offer five-cent-a-pound flights during the area's Yankee Homecoming
celebration.
Geography has also conspired to keep the airport visible and friendly. It
sits right along the edge of the winding Plum Island Turnpike, the main route
between downtown Newburyport and the sandy beaches of Plum Island. Plentiful
roadside parking and open access invite passing motorists to stop by for a
look at the small aircraft. Few houses are found nearby. Across the turnpike
to the north is the mouth of the Merrimack River; to the south and east are
wetlands and a wildlife refuge. All that open space makes it easier for the
pilots to avoid annoying the neighbors — though one Plum Island resident
complained in a letter to the Daily News about "low-flying planes hot-dogging
over our neighborhood."
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A T-shirt for sale at PJ's
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In May, as the petition at PJ's topped 2,500 signatures, SPNEA agreed to
meet with a group of interested parties. The society learned about the history
of the airport, its economic impact — pegged at $3 million annually by the
state's aviation agency — and they heard that the community likes the airport
the way it is, without chain-link fences or development. And SPNEA listened.
"We didn't know it was a historic airport," says Michael Lynch, of SPNEA. "We
now know better." After that meeting, SPNEA gradually began to reconsider its
stand. "After seeing how everybody felt, it opened their eyes a little bit,"
said McNeal, of PJ's.
SPNEA hired a consultant to assess the safety issues at the airport, and
recommend changes. That report was
completed late last month, and Lynch seemed reassured by it. "There's
nothing in [the consultant's] recommendations that I would see as a
deal-breaker," he said. "These are incremental improvements — extending a
physical barrier along the full length of the runway, better control over
access to keep kids and birders away from the runway, cutting down some
trees." Lynch now plans to recommend to SPNEA's board later this month that
they seek proposals from anyone who might want the runway lease. Already, he
said last week, five or six potential operators have expressed interest in the
site.
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The porch at Plum Island Airport
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But since the Hordons own part of the airport, what happens if SPNEA leases
its part of it to somebody else? "That is a complicating factor," Lynch
acknowledges. He suggested that perhaps the Hordons will submit the best
proposal, making the question moot. Or a new operator could negotiate an
arrangement with the Hordons, if they're willing. Or theoretically, the runway
could be extended, to make it usable without the 420 feet owned by the
Hordons. Lynch has heard from people who'd like to build an aviation history
museum on the site, and he's intrigued by that idea. But nothing has been
decided yet.
"We're committed to making this a public, open process," Lynch said. "We
were criticized before for making decisions behind closed doors." Once he has
proposals in hand, the next phase will be to invite public discussion. "What
kind of airport do people want? How much should we keep it the way it looks
now? We'll be looking for input in some kind of public forum." All of this
could take some time. Meanwhile, the Hordons wait to see how it will all play
out. "We're just in kind of a holding pattern," Kathy Hordon told
AVweb. "It's a very unusual situation."
Yes, it's unusual when a small, general aviation, public-use airport is
threatened and survives. It's unusual when business, government and residents
join together to keep aviation a part of their community. Here's hoping the
unusual will prevail, and generations to come will pull off the Plum Island
Turnpike on a summer afternoon, put their feet up on that worn wooden railing,
and watch — or fly along — as the wonder of wings, plain and simple, carries
on.
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