Court upholds noise limits for air tour operators

Grand Canyon air tour operators probably won't appeal a court ruling that upholds noise-restriction laws that limit flights over the national park.

A U.S. Court of Appeals ruling in Washington last week upholds laws designed to restore natural quiet to the park, including a provision to restructure flight corridors that eliminate flights in most of the Grand Canyon.

Several air tour groups challenged the law, saying the implementation of natural quiet was not what Congress had intended when the law was written.

"I can't speak for individual operators, but the early reaction I've seen is that we tried, and now we have to get on with it," said Bob McCune, executive director of the Las Vegas-based Grand Canyon Air Tour Council.

McCune said rules specifying routes would be drawn by November, then published in the federal register in January. At some point, a deadline for implementing the rules would be included.

The court also dismissed a suit from the Grand Canyon Trust, a Flagstaff, Ariz.-based environmental group, that contended the rules did not go far enough to implement natural quiet in the canyon.

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