Legal Issues Concerning the Safety and Security of General Aviation Airports (2025)
Chapter: III. AIRPORT DEFINED: THE FOUNDATION OF SAFETY AND SECURITY REGULATIONS
Methodology
Research for this digest seeks to clarify state and federal regulatory programs regarding safety and security for general aviation airports. The scope of this digest is limited to National Plan of Integrated Airport System (NPIAS) federally obligated, general aviation airports. Based on this limitation in scope, it is assumed that federal standards apply based on the contractual obligation and grant assurance guidance required at the time the airport became or renewed its obligation by accepting a federal grant. A thorough examination of federal obligations was not explored. Accordingly, the research endeavored to delineate the existence of state programs for safety and security, the method for establishing state safety and security standards, and the method used to enforce those standards.
The scope of the research included utilizing industry and legal knowledge to establish a base line set of inquiries into safety and security practices. Initially, a thorough review of State Block Grant Program state regulation was conducted. A survey was conducted to gather practices in design standards, activity standards, equipment standards, and security requirements and sent to the state aeronautics office in each state.
Additionally, a review of state statutory and regulatory law was conducted. Legal research was conducted using standard legal research techniques and included reference to codes, regulations, and official guidance, as well as journals, legal databases, and online resources. Upon receipt of state surveys, answers provided by the state were compared with the independent review. Not all states completed the online survey. States responses are captured by state in Appendix A.
III. AIRPORT DEFINED: THE FOUNDATION OF SAFETY AND SECURITY REGULATIONS
The state-specific definition of an airport is central to understanding airport safety and security regulations applicable to that airport. The applicability of regulations, both standards and safeguards, depends on the land use and activities involved in an area being defined as an airport.
No Standard Definition of an Airport
There is no standard definition of an airport in federal law or across jurisdictions. The lack of a standard definition results in the need to evaluate the federal airport establishment requirements and the state airport authorization statutes when applying safety and security regulations to an airport. While a landing area may look like an airport and function as a landing facility, it may not meet the definition of an airport triggering safety and security regulations. Likewise, an area that meets the definition of an airport, despite limited facilities or use, may receive additional statutory protections and the authorizations to control the airport environment and the area around the airport.
Several cases illustrate the importance of a landing area being defined as an airport. For instance, courts have limited not only the ability of airports to condemn property for “safety” functions, such as noise buffer areas, not specifically defined as an airport or airport critical area,48 but also limited other municipalities’ ability to condemn land necessary for airport safety functions.49
Open to the Public
Six states restrict the use of the term “airport” to “facilities that are open to the public and do not require prior permission to land.” In Georgia, Illinois, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, and Rhode Island, a facility that serves all other airport purposes would not necessarily receive all statutory protections if the facility is restricted to private-use. Recently, the Town of East Hampton50 attempted to transition its airport from public-use to private-use to assert greater operational control on the airport, including curfews and type of aircraft usage. The Town’s attempt to change the status of the airport failed based on the federal procedural requirements of the Airport Noise and Capacity Act.51 In this example, the Town asserted that moving from an airport, as defined by New York law, and a public-use airport as defined by the FAA, would change the Town’s ability to control activities at the airport.
Landing Areas Only or a More Expansive Definition
The definition of airport was a key factor in Boggs v. FAA.52 Boggs asserted a diminution in value claim and insisted that the City of Cleveland be required to acquire her house due to the approach surfaces that served the airport. The definition of the airport was limited in the Boggs decision to the landing area. The limitation of the definition specifically excluded the approach surfaces. Approach surfaces are the surfaces that extend outward and upward from primary or runway surfaces.53 The FAA considers the protection of clear approach surfaces as a critical safety function.54 Ohio does not include approach surfaces in its definition of an airport. Three states—Hawaii, Louisiana, and Oklahoma—specifically include approach surfaces in the definition of airport.55 The petitioner in Boggs attempted to establish itself as a third-party beneficiary of an obligated airport’s contract with the FAA in Grant Assurance 4. A state law claim in one of the three states that include approach
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48 Highland Realty, Inc. v. Indianapolis Airport Auth., 182 Ind. App. 439 (Ind. Ct. App. 1979).
49 Township of Readington v. Solberg Aviation Co., 409 N.J. Super. 282 (N.J. Super. Ct. 2009), aff’d, 2019 N.J. Super. Unpub. LEXIS 472 (2019).
50 The East Hampton Airport is the subject of years of litigation, including Friends of the E. Hampton Airport, Inc. v. Town of E. Hampton, 841 F.3d 133 (2d Cir. 2016).
51 Matter of E. End Hangars, Inc. v. Town of E. Hampton, N.Y., 2024 N.Y. slip op. 1709 (N.Y. App. Div. 2024).
52 Boggs v. FAA, 764 Fed. App’x 480, 481 (6th Cir. 2019).
53 See 14 C.F.R. pt. 77.
54 John Dermody, Director, Office of Airport Safety and Standards, Approach and Departure Surface Protection, FAA Policy Guidance (Sept. 19, 2022).
surfaces might sustain the claim that the airport is responsible for the area beyond the airport’s landing area.56
Evolving Definition
The definition of airport varies widely from state to state. The Uniform Aeronautical Regulatory Act of 1935 defined an airport based on the engineering standards of the day. The design criteria for the length of runways was 1,800 feet long, and the width requirement provided the ability to land in six directions, which demonstrates the flexible nature of runways in the 1930s. The concept of defining these minimum safety standards for an airport was the foundation of establishing safety for early aviators. Today, several states continue to use basic safety requirements as the threshold for defining an airport. The definition of an airport continues to evolve, and the burgeoning Vertical Take-off and Landing (VTOL) and Short Take-off and Landing (STOL) aircraft markets highlight the challenge of applying 90-year-old aviation concepts to the modern aviation industry.
Interaction of Federal and State Definitions
The federal statutory definition of an airport is straightforward.
49 U.S.C. § 47102 defines an airport as:
an area of land or water used or intended to be used for the landing and taking off of aircraft; an appurtenant area used or intended to be used for airport buildings or other airport facilities or right of way; and airport buildings and facilities located in any of those areas; and includes a heliport.
The establishment of an airport is required by 14 C.F.R. Part 157. Part 157 evaluates the proximity of airports to separate traffic patterns and recommends other air safety measures.
Part 157 defines an airport as “any airport, heliport, helistop, vertiport, gliderport, seaplane base, ultralight flightpark, manned balloon launching facility, or other aircraft landing or takeoff area.”57 The Part 157 definition of a heliport is “any landing or takeoff area intended for use by helicopters or other rotary wing type aircraft capable of vertical takeoff and landing profiles.”58
Not all airports are required to notify the FAA of construction, alteration, activation, or deactivation of an airport as dictated in Part 157 creating a notice exclusion. This means that areas used as airports may not be publicly identified as airports. For example, no notice is required under Part 157 for “intermittent use of a site that is not an established airport, which is used or intended to be used for less than one year and at which flight operations will be conducted only under VFR.”59 An example of this is an area of a farmer’s field used by aerial application aircraft during growing season. Likewise, a temporary landing facility in a metropolitan area near an established airport may not trigger the requirements in Part 157.
However, the notice exclusion of a temporary airport may not apply to state regulatory filings. State regulations may also place additional regulations on airports to restrict usage to specific circumstances. A general aviation airport could object to the placement of a temporary facility that is not required to provide notice under the federal scheme, if the state’s definition of an airport is more expansive than the FAA’s.
The FAA does not distinguish between public and private-use airports in Part 157. Five states exclude restricted-use airports from their definition of airport. The definition of restricted-use airport or restricted landing area is not uniform among the states. It may be a facility that is private and requires prior permission to land, similar to the FAA definition of a private-use facility, or a facility with limitations placed by the state. A facility that is restricted-use in Delaware, Florida, Maine, Massachusetts, or North Carolina may not receive the scrutiny or statutory protections reserved for an airport, because by definition it is not an airport.
The FAA defines airport hazards in 14 C.F.R. Part 77. Part 77 does not create a new definition of an airport. However, it does define the review criteria based on the runway. There are three distinct runway types: (i) precision instrument runway, (ii) utility runway, and (iii) visual runway. State airport hazard programs may adopt the FAA scheme, recognize the FAA scheme, or adopt an independent regulatory scheme. A state may also adopt a different approach to define potential hazards to air navigation. For instance, Arkansas’ limitation on the placement of towers in the vicinity of airports does not make any distinction based on the type of runway.60
Variations in State Definitions
Not all states define the term “airport.”61 However, state definitions typically contain similar phraseology but frequently contain nuanced language. The most common terms, delineated in bold, are captured in Texas’s definition of an airport: “(a) an area used or intended for use for the landing and takeoff of an aircraft; (b) an appurtenant area used or intended for use of an airport building or other airport facility or right-of-way; and (c) an airport building of facility located on an appurtenant area.”62
The Alabama statutory definition of airport is “Any area of land, water, or of mechanical construction, except a restricted landing area, which is used, made available, or designed for the landing and takeoff of aircraft, whether or not the facilities are provided for shelter, servicing, or repair of aircraft or for receiving and discharging passengers or cargo and which meets the minimum requirements as to size, design, surfacing, marking, equipment, and management as provided by the Alabama
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56 Boggs was determined on the definition of airport and the petitioner’s lack of standing to assert violation of a grant assurance.
57 Id.
58 Id.
59 14 C.F.R. § 157.2 (emphasis added).
60 A.C.A. § 27-117-105.
61 The lack of a definition of airport was the central issue in Cheyenne v. Bd. of Cnty. Comm’rs, 484 P.2d 706, 707 (Wyo. 1971). In an issue regarding the application of tax exemption to property owned, but not necessarily used by the City, the Court determined that the primary use of the property must be an airport- or aviation-related purpose.
62 TEX. TRANSP. CODE § 22.001.
