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For well over a decade, New York City residents fed up with helicopter noise have been pushing to ban or severely restrict non-essential helicopter flights over the city. These activists haven’t succeeded in banning helicopters outright, but they notched a significant win in 2016 when the city reached an agreement with Saker Aviation Services, then the operator of the Downtown Manhattan Heliport, to reduce the number of helicopter tour flights out of the facility by 50 percent — from nearly 60,000 per year to just under 30,000.
Groups including Stop the Chop NY/NJ haven’t stopped pushing to ban helicopter tour and charter flights over New York City and the surrounding metro area. With the advent of electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft, they have simply adjusted their tactics. Activists are now advocating for legislation that would prohibit non-essential operations by conventional helicopters, but not quieter eVTOLs, at New York City heliports (with exceptions made for “essential” flights by military, police, air ambulance and news helicopters).
The details of the bill are still under negotiation by New York City councilmembers, but the effort illustrates how the longstanding politics of helicopter noise are shaping the introduction of electric air taxis in one of the world’s most desirable markets for urban air mobility. Beyond the stick of a possible ban, there is also a carrot for New York tour and charter operators to transition their fleets from helicopters to eVTOLs: the promise of lower landing fees for quiet electric aircraft, at least at the Downtown Manhattan Heliport (also known by its location identifier, JRB). Discounted rates would also benefit eVTOL developers Joby Aviation and Archer Aviation, which are looking to operate their own air taxi services from the facility and would need relatively low landing fees in order to offer affordable prices to customers.
“We do intend to make it more economically attractive to land and operate an eVTOL out of the heliport as compared to a comparable helicopter,” said Addison Ferrell, director of infrastructure for U.K.-based Skyports, which partnered with France’s Groupe ADP on a successful bid to operate the Downtown Manhattan Heliport starting in early 2025. “So we do want to make it such that there are incentives for operators, whether new or existing, to transfer over to eVTOLs over time.”
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