Miramar Airport Town Hall

[Carlsbadliving]

I don’t know if adding MCRD’s 400 acres to the existing 600 would help. The problem is that they need another runway. Lindbergh is the busiest single runway airport in the country. I think the goal was to find a site that had 3,000 acres. That’s 3 times as big as the current airport plus MCRD.

I personally would support Miramar. Centrally located, plenty of room. Until the military gives us a better idea of why we can’t have it, that will stay my opionin. I don’t see national defense as a problem. The base would still remain open, they’d just have a commercial airport next door. How would that impede national defense? Training flights could go on as they do now. And if there ever was an attack or some sort of problem, obviously the base would take precedent. Besides commercial airports close down anyway (at least they did during and after 9/11).

[PD]

Military jets train regularly in airspace over the ocean. Just up and moving the base to some other location is ridiculous and clearly shows that you know nothing of the training requirements. Regular people “seeing no problem” with airspace requirements demonstrate that they don’t understand them.

He scratches his gut and leans back in plastic lawn chair. “Hey, just move ‘em all to Kansas they won’t bother nobody there.” He belches and takes another swig of Bud Light.

[Carlsbadliving]

I’m not even saying Miramar needs to move. Why can’t they both be there. I’m sure that ocean training exercises could still go on even with a commercial jet taking off every few minutes.

[PD]

There are all sorts of ingress/egress issues with an airport. Increasing the traffic may not be feasible for safety reasons. I am not expert on air traffic patterns but neither is anybody else on this board. I invite anyone who understands current airspace usage and requirements over San Diego to speak up.

[JES]

The fact that the Marine Corps by its nature is a sea, air and land force vastly complicates that argument. It is in fact necessary to have bases near coastal areas. Amphibious assaults practiced at Pendleton utilize aircraft from Miramar, and virtually every training exercise has a sea based element attached to it that involves the Navy and the Marine Corps working together. By way of analogy, many wireless companies locate themselves in San Diego to be near Qualcomm, and the Marine Corps needs to be close to the Navy even though a place like Kansas would be cheaper.

Operationally, when Marines deploy – often including Miramar Marines with their aircraft – they embark on ships stationed in San Diego and deploy to places like Iraq. In the end the argument is not whether we could move Miramar, but where we would move it to. You need a coastal city, located near the Navy, with 5000 acres open to build.

It is also worth noting that the military industrial complex in San Diego to include employers like Northrop, ViaSat, SpaWar etc. all have important interactions with a base like Miramar. And lastly, the bases pump a large amount of $$ into the local economies.

I do believe that the military is protecting its turf, but rightfully so in some cases.

[JES]

(Last reply was to Perry)

[PerryChase]

America is very big. Surely, there has to be some unused space along our coasts that would be suitable for a Miramar type base. They are not looking for that alternative and they don’t want to think about it either. They just wave the flag instead. Flag waving is known to be a good tactic to shut down opposition.

[JES]

Moving Miramar Marines and aircraft to Pendleton is another option that I would like to look into further. There is already a large air station at Pendleton and it could be expanded. Seems to me that although it would be complicated and involve moving 10,000 Marines and hundreds of aircraft, it would be a feasible option. The military in general will not be open to this becasue once they are it would indicate that they are willing to close Miramar. However, for the military this may be preferable to sharing Miramar.

[JES]

Perry, if you truly believe that then it is up to like minded people like you to convince the Marine Corps to move out of San Diego to some yet to be determined coastal city, not up to the Marine Corps to convince you otherwise. They’re a bit busy right now fighting a war in Iraq.

[PD]

Perrychase seems to think the government should go out and spend billions upon billions to buy new land and build new runways and infrastructure so that San Diego can have a new civilian airport and make things more convenient for San Diegans. How about finding an alternative spot for the new San Diego airport instead?
Further, Perrychase did not respond with any real information regarding airspace usage. Instead he tried to deflect the issue by insinuating that anyone who defends the use of Miramar as a strictly military enterprise must be a foolish flagwaver.
San Diego encroached on Miramar and Camp Pendleton. It was not the other way around.
“Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country.”

[lindismith]

In my ideal world, the airport is completely torn down at the harbor, and replaced with a beautiful park, that is open space for all the city dwellers packed in around that area; the airport is moved down towards the border; and a high-speed train is built from downtown to take people out to the airport so they don’t have to drive. That drive currently takes me 15 mintues from Hillcrest, so a train that could get you there in the same amount of time, would be terrific.
Can you imagine how property values would increase in Pt. Loma, OB, Mission Hills, Banker’s Hill and downtown if we got rid of airport noise? Can you imagine how traffic would be reduced with high-speed transport in and out of downtown? Can you imagine how beautiful the city would look with a park instead of a run-way in it’s center?

[PerryChase]

I’m not against the military. My best friend is a naval officer. We disagree on many issues but we remain friends.

I don’t know enough about military strategy, but I do know that we live in a civilian democracy so military needs are secondary to civilian well-being. The military needs to adjust to what is best for civilians, not the other way around.

Lindismith, I support your park idea. However, I wouldn’t hold my breath because when the airport is closed, the development interests will swoop in and we’ll have more luxury condo towers.

In my view, Miramar would work best because it’s already an airport with all the crading already done. It’s centrally located and therefore convenient to all residents of the county, north and south. Linking a new airport at Miramar to public transport would be even better.

[lindismith]

As a community here at Piggington, we should think about how we can create the kind of city we want going forward.

Certainly after Kroll’s report yesterday, we’re going to see some changes in leadership.

We are all fairly well like-minded indviduals. On some things we disagree, but those are mostly small details. We all seem to really care about our city.

Public transport, the airport, affordible housing, more jobs – look how much time we spend discussing and learning about these issues.

[PD]

“military needs are second to civilian well-being”
This is typical of an entitlement society that can’t see the forest for the trees.

[JES]

Agreed

Instead of spending billions on expanding our terrorist hunting special forces why don’t we spend the money on rec centers and bike lanes so that every San Diegan can train to be a triathlete.

After all, it’s not as if we have any enemies in the world. And if we do it’s only because the current administration made them our enemies. 9/11 was our fault, and groups like Al Qeada and Hezbolla are generally very nice people. It’s just that we misunderstand them and their culture.

No way. If any needs should be secondary it should be the self absorbed needs of many in SoCal to live life for the sole purpose of aquiring a bigger house, more expensive car and a lifestyle they can flaunt. 18 year old American heroes at Miramar and Pendleton who are mostly dirt poor and come from humble beginnings but still managed to raise their hand to volunteer for something greater than themselves are whose well being we should be concerned with.

Every time I see someone driving a Mercedes or BMW I think to myself that they could have bought a Toyota and dotated the $10,000 difference to charity, or God forbid to the Wounded Warriors Project, a group that buys necessities for wounded troops and flys their families out to see them at the hospital.

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