"Logan adding a $65m runway fail-safe; Extension into harbor stirs multiple concerns" August 22, 2011|By David Abel, Globe Staff
Logan International Airport has launched a $65 million project that will close the airport’s longest runway for at least six months and extend it hundreds of feet into Boston Harbor.
The project, which began in June, has required careful orchestration to balance environmental and neighbors’ concerns with the pounding of pile drivers and the arrival and departure of about 1,100 flights a day.
“This is a project that costs a lot of money, and we will hopefully never have to use it,’’ said Edward C. Freni, the airport’s director of aviation.
The undertaking, paid for mostly by federal grants and scheduled to be completed in 2013, will extend the existing runway safety area 400 feet on a hulking pier upheld by more than 300 concrete pylons that are being bored into the seabed....
But the project’s impact on eelgrass, a critical habitat for fish and shellfish, and the diversion of flights to other runways have upset some neighbors, who have complained about an increased number of planes flying over homes in East Boston, Winthrop, and Chelsea. They say the additional noise has been hard to take and have lobbied the Massachusetts Port Authority, which oversees Logan, to provide soundproofing for homes....
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