Beverly Airport Hangar Delay Will Not Impact Runway Construction

BEVERLY, MA — While Danvers residents looking to slow development at Beverly Airport may have won a temporary reprieve after the state Department of Public Health put the breaks on a proposed 39,000 square-foot storage hangar while it examined its potential impact on noise and groundwater pollution, Airport Manager Gabriel Hanafin told Patch on Monday that delay will not impact a proposed runway reconstruction residents have also expressed concerns about out of fears that it will lead to expanded traffic.

"We welcome the oversight and look forward to DEP's ruling on the appeal," Hannafin said of the pause on the FlightLevel Aviation hangar project Monday. "We appreciate FlightLevel's cooperation at every level throughout this process.

"The delay caused by the appeal has no effect or bearing on the future runway reconstruction project as the two projects are unrelated."

• Danvers Eyes Greater Voice On Beverly Airport Commission

Hannafin told residents at a Danvers Select Board meeting last month that the purpose of the hangar is not to lure more traffic to the airport and may actually decrease takeoffs because, currently without the storage area, planes often drop off passengers in Beverly, fly to nearby airports in Bedford or Norwood while passengers are in town, and then have to fly back to Beverly to pick them up before, again, taking off to bring clients home.

"You don't see the: 'If we build it, they will come' mentality so much in airport development," Hanafin told the Select Board. "This hangar is for aircraft that are currently using Beverly Airport. They just want the aircraft to be able to be housed at Beverly Airport.

"These are aircraft that are already at Beverly, already using the airport. This just gives them a place to house it and thus cutting out those empty (passenger) legs in between."

Hanafin said the proposal does not include any maintenance or repair facilities inside the hangar.

"It's just for storage," Hanafin said.

• 'People Were Very Angry': Beverly Airport Director Talks Danvers Noise Complaints

Hanafin said the separate runway project — which includes an additional 300 feet of pavement on either way of the runway — is a Federal Aviation Administration- and Massachusetts Department of Transportation-funded project designed to create a safer runway.

"They say the lifespan of a runway is 20 to 25 years," he said. "We hit that lifespan 15 years ago. They've put lots of Band-Aids on it to kind of bridge the gap but it's not to the point where the FAA wants to see a new runway there.

"The FAA is not doing this not to attract larger aircraft here. They see that those aircraft are already here and they want that increased safety margin. They want that 600-foot increase in safety distance."

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)