Traverse City Cherry Capital Airport Engaging in RPZ Easement Acquisitions

The Airport has acquired three of nine Runway Protection Zone properties and is reported to be seeking easements for the balance of them.

According to the Traverse City Record Eagle, the Cherry Capital Airport in Traverse City is engaged in acquiring properties in order to protect its Runway Protection Zone or RPZ.  In a May 21, 2021 article, the Record Eagle describes the process of acquiring three of nine RPZ properties and quotes the airport director, who indicated that “For the six remaining properties — two on the west side and four on the east side of the runway — the NRAC will likely seek easements…”

The RPZ is an area designated by the FAA. According to the FAA, they “are a trapezoidal area ‘off the end of the runway end that serves to enhance the protection of people and property on the ground’ in the event an aircraft lands or crashes beyond the runway end.” “Compatible land use within the RPZ is generally restricted to such land uses as agricultural and similar uses that do not involve congregations of people or construction of buildings or other improvements that may be obstructions.” 

I have extensive experience representing property owners impacted by an RPZ. For example, this published appellate decision upholds one of two jury verdicts that I obtained in Lenawee County. In those cases, the County was obligated to purchase homes after avigation easements were imposed. The appellate decision quotes some of the trial testimony. According to the County’s own aviation expert:

Q. And everybody knows what [RPZs] should be, there should be no houses in the [RPZs], that's what should happen, right?

A. It's the FAA design criteria, so yes.

* * *

Q. Do you believe that incompatible uses within the RPZ include homes?

A. Yes.

Yet again without objection Ward conceded that the FAA “recommends that whenever possible the entire RPZ be owned by the airport and clear of all obstructions if practicable[.]”

The same expert for the County testified that property owners are entitled to be paid just compensation resulting from their properties being placed in an RPZ at the time of the acquisition of those rights, notwithstanding the earlier placement of their properties in the RPZ.

Q. If you—if you're going to put—if an airport that you're working for is going to put somebody in a RPZ, do they have to acquire property rights?

A. Yes.

Q. And when they acquire those property rights either—that's the point in time where the property owner has a right to be—receive whatever just compensation they're entitled to receive under whatever law that is?

A. Yes, sir.

Q. So you can't just go put somebody in a RPZ and then come back later and say we're not going to pay you for it because it was in the plans from before?

A. That is correct.

The Court of Appeals ultimately held that it would have been inappropriate to assert that the placement of properties in an RPZ mandated their acquisition in fee but upheld a jury verdict determining that the imposition of an avigation easement and the safety issues associated with it would allow a jury to determine that full value should be paid for the properties. These were factual determinations based upon extensive expert testimony that I either elicited directly from the Airport’s own experts or from experts hired by the property owners. 

Further, in addition to just compensation, other benefits are available to property owners like payment of interest, attorney fee and cost reimbursement, and potentially payment of 125% of the total just compensation to the extent that the taking involves a residential home.

I am currently representing multiple property owners in airport acquisitions, including owners at the nearby Frankfort City-County Airport. If you are experiencing issues with an airport, please feel free to contact me.