On October 2, Palm Beach County’s Department of Airports, which runs the airport, filed its comment on the FAA’s proposed permanent rule.1 It is careful, clear, and in several places stronger than anything we have written. It supports protecting the President, supports a formal Special Flight Rules Area made through public rulemaking, and supports temporary flight restrictions when the President is in residence. It also asks the FAA to:
- Set the ceiling at 1,000 feet, as the Secret Service requested, or explain why 2,000. The County says the FAA’s own March 2025 traffic study showed nearly all eastbound departures well above 1,000 feet over Mar-a-Lago, and that those are among the loudest flights at the airport.2
- Keep departures over the ocean wherever it can. The County says it averaged fewer than 100 noise comments a year before the restriction, and has received more than 12,000 since.3
- Consider restoring the former routes for airlines in TSA-approved security programs, asking whether those routes would give security comparable to the procedures the proposal already allows inside the restricted area.4
- Measure the rule against life before October 2025, count the costs to residents, and compare real alternatives, including a restriction only when the President is in residence.5
- Prepare an environmental assessment that studies the restriction and the redesigned flight paths together, as the single plan the FAA’s own documents describe.6
- Explain why the restriction must apply all year, and provide for regular public review.7
The County also asks the FAA to study the rule’s effect on a planned runway extension and on the airport’s future capacity. Those requests concern the airport’s operations; they are not ones the Coalition makes.
We have reorganized our own requests around the points we share with the County. They are on Stay Involved.
Footnotes
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Palm Beach County Department of Airports, comment FAA-2026-10827-1196, signed October 1, 2026 by Executive Director Laura M. Beebe, with three attachments from the court record. The County is also a petitioner in the court case over the restriction (Palm Beach County v. FAA, D.C. Cir. No. 25-1282). ↩
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The comment, p. 5 and Attachment 2: “In developing the SSI, the FAA’s analysis indicated that nearly all aircraft departing the Airport to the east were well above 1,000 feet when overflying Mar-a-Lago,” and “these operations are also among the loudest operations at the Airport because of aircraft engine settings on departure.” Our own analysis of the 19 days before the restriction found 99.3% of departures crossing the circle above 1,000 feet (The 2,000-Foot Question). ↩
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The comment, pp. 3–4: “on average, less than 100 noise-related comments per year” before the restriction, and “more than 12,000 comments and complaints” since; it asks whether the rule “or associated flight procedures can be configured to retain runway-heading departures over the ocean to the greatest extent practicable.” ↩
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The comment, pp. 4–5, asking the FAA to consider extending the rule’s exemption to airlines operating under TSA-approved security programs and to evaluate restoring the pre-October 2025 procedures for them. The proposal says current procedures “place aircraft at about the 0.85 NM mark,” inside the one-nautical-mile area. ↩
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The comment, pp. 6–7, calling the proposal’s cost baseline “circular” and asking for comparisons with the pre-October 2025 operating environment, “a residence-only TFR,” and a modified rule. ↩
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The comment, pp. 7–8, and Attachments 1 and 3 (an FAA Southern Region briefing of November 2025, and the FAA Administrator’s letter to the Secret Service of October 10, 2025). More on The Environmental Review. ↩
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The comment, pp. 2 and 6, citing 49 U.S.C. § 40103(b)(3), which directs the FAA to “encourage and allow maximum use of the navigable airspace by civil aircraft consistent with national security.” ↩