AMA News
Flying Site Assistance Joe Beshar | [email protected]
Doing More Than Talk
Staying in contact with Waste Management Inc., headquartered in Houston, Texas, for the last five years and keeping them abreast of the EPA/AMA Superfund projects and modeling developments for the use of landfills as model flying sites is proving to be fruitful. Waste Management has always been understanding and cooperative toward our needs.
After the April 26, 2006 opening of the EPA Superfund flying site in Fridley, Minnesota, Jack Dowden, Waste Management Director of Closed Landfills Midwest Group, recognized the need for flying sites and reviewed his area of responsibility for possible locations. He sent the following list of property sites he feels could be appropriate and available. Their appropriateness must be evaluated by interested clubs.
Any club interested in one of these sites should visit it to make sure it is suitable, then contact Jack in his Chicago office at (630) 572-2465 to coordinate use of the site. Please keep Joe Beshar advised of action taken and progress.
Jack indicated a number of sites in the Midwest that have the space and topographic configurations potentially suitable for model aeronautics use. The locations include the following:
- Oregon, Wisconsin: south-central Wisconsin, 15 miles south of Madison.
- Bellevue, Wisconsin: northeast Wisconsin, 8 miles southeast of Green Bay.
- Raymond, Wisconsin: southeast Wisconsin, 12 miles south of Milwaukee.
- Muskego, Wisconsin: southeast Wisconsin, 18 miles southwest of Milwaukee (there are high-voltage power lines that bisect this site).
- Minonk, Illinois: central Illinois, 30 miles north of Bloomington.
- South Elgin, Illinois: northeast Illinois, 35 miles west of downtown Chicago.
- Plainfield, Illinois: northeast Illinois, 28 miles southwest of downtown Chicago.
- Madison, Illinois: southwest Illinois, 15 miles east of downtown St. Louis, Missouri.
- Wheeler, Indiana: northwest Indiana, 25 miles southeast of downtown Chicago.
- Fort Wayne, Indiana: northeast Indiana, 7 miles east of downtown Fort Wayne.
- Ossian, Indiana: northeast Indiana, 15 miles south of downtown Fort Wayne.
- Topeka, Kansas: eastern Kansas, 5 miles south of Topeka.
- Furley, Kansas: central Kansas, 15 miles north of Wichita.
Jack wrote that all of these sites are currently underutilized and he would welcome the opportunity to talk to clubs about possible partnerships. Please call him to discuss any of these sites or pass his contact information on to your local club representatives.
Alameda Hornets Squadron — NAS Alameda
Mike Simi reports that the Alameda Hornets Squadron now calls the old Alameda Naval Air Station home. There has been a long history of attempts to gain access to this site, and now it is a reality through the support of the EPA Superfund partnership program.
The club has use of 1,300 feet of the old 8,000-foot runway and the old seaplane lagoon for float flying, making this site an enviable flying facility. Mike worked with the regional EPA manager and wrote the following:
“In October 2005, I started to think about having an alternative to the problem of high winds at an old, established flying club in the summer months. Having grown up in Alameda and knowing of the closing of NAS Alameda, I thought it would be a perfect fit.
“In January 2006, I began inquiries at the City of Alameda planning board. After a few conversations I was finally put in touch with the property management group that works for the city.
“The initial response was positive regarding the access and use of an old 8,000-foot runway, but money talks and the current lessees held the line against us.
“A few other locations were considered, but we finally came to an agreement with Mike Hampen, property manager; Nanette Banks, the financial planner; and Andrew Thomas, the city planner supervisor.
“The memo of understanding between the EPA and the AMA has served us well and still does in negotiations with the City of Alameda and its property managers. As the subject of our requests for use of contaminated lagoons and old Navy taxiways arose, we at Alameda Hornet Squadron were bolstered in our arguments by the fact that EPA/AMA cooperation and our consideration of the environmental issues play an important part in assuring the City of Alameda that AMA and our new club are on the leading edge of cleanup, reuse, and protection of these old and deserted government lands.
“The selected area is a huge piece of concrete taxiway, approximately 1,300 feet, in front of the old NAS passenger terminal, which is now the NAS museum.”
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
