Whipped Cream Difficulties

First, Stockton. Now the California city of Mammoth Lakes has filed for bankruptcy.

Interestingly, this does not appear to be a municipal pension or bond problem. Instead, the city lost a lawsuit against a developer, who was awarded $43 million in damages. The developer agreed to make improvements to the local airport (Mammoth Yosemite Airport) in return for rights to build a $400 million hotel on part of the airport property, along with an option on the land.

However, it seems that the city discovered there were issues with FAA policy with respect to the airport improvements, and decided they’d delay the hotel project, at which point the developer sued and won. The LAT specifically mentions that both parties wanted to extend the airport runway to handle 757s. Looking at this document, I think we’re talking roughly 2,500 meters or about 8,200 feet as the bare minimum runway length needed to handle a 757. (The actual takeoff and landing distance depends on airport elevation, atmospheric conditions, weight, and a host of other factors. as shown in the charts. According to various sources, Mammoth Lakes is at an altitude of about 7,900 feet, though the airport is at 7,135 feet according to AirNav. AirNav also shows the two active runways at 7,134.8 feet and 7,061.4 feet. So we’re talking probably a minimum of 1,200 additional feet of runway, maybe more if you want to have some margin.)

This entry was posted on Monday, July 2nd, 2012 at 9:02 pm and is filed under California Über Alles, Clippings, Law, Planes, Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.