Conservation, Cape Cod Commission Approve Airport Tree Plan

CHATHAM – The airport commission’s vegetation management plan was approved last week by the conservation commission, which attached a lengthy list of conditions and mitigation requirements to the project.

The Cape Cod Commission also OK’d the plan as a modification to its 2005 development of regional impact approval of a previous airport master plan, largely echoing the same conditions and requirements imposed by the conservation commission.

The plan calls for selectively removing trees that have grown up into the flight path in an approximately two-acre area around a vernal pool at the southwest end of the runway, as well as around nearby ponds. The plan does not cover the planned removal of trees that have grown up into the flight path on upland around the airport and on private property.

In its order of conditions, the conservation commission stressed that it was approving variances from wetlands regulation chiefly due to safety requirements set by the Federal Aviation Administration and the Massachusetts Department of Transportation’s Aeronautics Division.

The conservation commission’s approval came after eight months of hearings and meetings, chair Karen Lattin said at the commission’s July 24 session. It was not always an easy process, she said, but commission members understood its significance.

“We realize this project is unique, controversial, and probably the most significant order we’ve issued,” she said. It was “evident from the beginning” that “safety was paramount,” she added, and there was an “overriding public interest” to allow the project.

The commission received “hundreds of pages” of documents, emails and letters from the public and responded with a “very strong order, working to protect all of the areas of this project that are within our jurisdiction,” Lattin said.

Vice Chair Elise Gordon added, “We have learned that in matters of aviation, the federal FAA and state requirements preempt local requirements.”

The order sets out specific methods for tree removal. Trees must be removed using hand tools and stumps and trunks left in place to provide wildlife habitat. No work can be done during active vernal pool periods; cutting can only occur when the ground is frozen, dry or otherwise stable. The airport commission must hire a consultant to monitor the work and report to the conservation commission. The work will take place in phases over several years.

The plan does not specify the number of trees to be removed, so the height of each tree must be evaluated and documented to establish the exact number. For each tree removed, $70 must be paid into a special fund which will be used to plant new trees on town-owned property, ideally in an area where they can grow into a woodland system to replace the woodlands being removed, according to the order.

Invasive species will also be removed from the project area and a native seed mix applied to areas that remain bare after the first peak growing season after cutting.

“We feel that the combination of these three solutions will work to balance the ecosystem losses,” Gordon said.

On July 25, the full Cape Cod Commission approved a modification of its 2005 development of regional impact decision incorporating the vegetation management plan. Conditions adopted by the commission are basically the same as in the conservation commission’s order.

Chair Harold Mitchell noted that, like the conservation commission, the Cape Cod Commission’s review focused on its land use jurisdiction, not on aviation issues. Public comments about noise and allegations that the tree clearing is being done to allow larger aircraft to use the airport were “nothing that we can discuss and go over,” he said. “I don’t have a crystal ball. I cannot tell you what the Chatham Airport is going to do 10 years from now.”

The airport has uses that are important for the entire community, he noted, referring to a recent Medflight from the airport to a Boston hospital that probably saved the life of an injured boater.

Two commissioners were not happy with the decision. Elizabeth Taylor of Brewster said the 2005 DRI allowed the airport to prune and top trees, but that had not been done. She also worried that removal of the surrounding tree canopy would impact surface temperatures around the vernal pool. Jacqueline Etsten of Harwich suggested the plan was a “stalking horse” to allow jets to use the airport.

Airport Commission Chair Huntley Harrison responded that there are no plans to encourage use of the airport by planes that cannot already land there.

“Small jets land now,” he said. “We are a 24/7, 365 [day] airport; if an airplane can land safely, then they can land safely.”

He acknowledged that the airport had not kept up with the trimming of trees over time, adding that the work was identified in the 2021 master plan update and must be done both for safety and to comply with state and federal grant requirements. In its decision, the commission cited a letter from MassDOT certifying that vegetation currently violates protected airspace.

The commission approved the DRI modification 12-2, with Taylor and Etsten opposed.

Although he doesn’t fully agree with “the strictness of some of the provisions” imposed by the two commissions, Harrison said the airport commission will abide by the conditions “to the letter.”

The airport commission was “extremely pleased” with the approval but expects some pushback, he added in an email. “I have no idea what form this will take — an appeal to either or both commissions, letters to the editor, some form of legal action — regardless of what it is, we will be prepared,” he wrote.

Harrison added that he anticipates “some relief” for the tree payments to come from the FAA and MassDOT.