Well, the hunt for a new airport location is redirected (“WA lawmakers punt hunt for major airport site far into the future,” The Herald, May 16). Out with the Commercial Aviation Coordinating Commission (CACC) and in with a new governmental group, with no mandate to recommend specific locations and no deadline to make any decisions. Wonderful!

Air passenger traffic here is growing steadily, and yet again, the state of Washington is way behind. Much like building light rail 40 years too late. What I find most incredible (as in incredibly stupid) is the fact that just prior to it being disbanded, the CACC released a factoid that should have everyone shaking their heads. Here is the news: upon further study, a site near Enumclaw was found to be unviable because — now get this — its potential flight approach patterns overlapped those of Sea-Tac. Now this may seem elementary, but if I was looking for a place to put an airport, one of the first questions that I’d ask is; “Can we actually fly in and out of here and not hit another airplane”?

But apparently the CACC didn’t realize that this could be a show stopper until “further study.” Really? I wonder just how long they kept Enumclaw on the list before anyone spotted this problem. It’s probably a good thing that the CACC is no more.

Brian Mills

Snohomish