By Celeste Venolia
On a drippy late October afternoon, a large group of rugged New Englanders joined together for a short walk to talk about the campaign to end private jet expansion at Hanscom Airfield or anywhere. We ranged the gambit from being brand new to hearing about the proposed project to being advocates deeply involved in the campaign to stop it. The short version of my pitch of why you should care to stop this expansion of private jet hangar space is that it's a high carbon and environmental cost with low societal benefit (read more about the campaign here). Thank you to Molly and Janet for helping answer questions and tell the story of why the climate math of this proposed expansion and private jet emissions in general is pretty mind boggling! It’s awesome to be able to engage in lively dialogue while enjoying a beautiful place. We were such a large group that it was tricky to find a spot where we could all stand in a circle along the trail, but the one on one conversations were a value that a webinar would likely not have provided.
One of the initial points of confusion was the walk location, we were walking in Hartwell Town Forest and George Jordan Conservation Area and not in the direct site of the proposed expansion. This was largely due to access, but these town forests also have their own interesting stories to tell. Hartwell is dominated by beautiful towering pine trees and feels similar to many protected secondary forests in Massachusetts. George Jordan is in the flight path of Hanscom airfield, so industrial logging equipment has been brought in occasionally to remove trees that have grown too tall relative to the flight path. This understandable safety measure means that George Jordan is a really stark example of a forest ecosystem with higher disturbance. There is lots of poison ivy and open space under the existing trees where smaller trees have not always been able to grow back partly due to pressure from deer browsing for food.
Please sign the petition if you haven’t already done so to let the Healey administration know that this expansion is not the right direction for Massachusetts. Keep an eye out in the coming weeks for a roll out of a kit for supporters to encourage their towns/cities to pass a resolution opposing the private jet expansion at Hanscom or anywhere & sending it to the Governor. Interested in adding your organization to our growing coalition? Email info@stopprivatejetexpansion.org.
A big thank you to Tyler who volunteered to lead this outing! We’d love to see more advocacy and environmental education outings happen across the state! If you are interested in learning more about becoming an outings leader, check out the information here and email celeste.venolia@sierraclub.org with questions.