^{Figure 1. Iasi International Airport and surrounding communities (source: Google Maps)}

Iasi Airport is located in the North-East of Romania, on a hill of approximately 180m height and eight kilometres away from the centre of Iasi city. The overall north-eastern region has an approximate number of 3.8 million residents. Passenger volume increased significantly, from 200,000 passengers in 2012 to 1,5 million passengers in 2019. Forecast for the next five years reaches the number of 2 million passengers per year.

Noise regulations

The Environmental Noise Directive (END) was transposed into the National Legislation in 2005. Updated versions were published through the years, together with the necessary framework for implementing and evaluating its provisions. The last update was the implementation of the new Noise Law in 2018. Additionally, Strategic Noise Maps and Action Plans were developed in 2014.

The case study of Iasi Airport is to understand the impact of noise from the airport on its surrounding communities and also to engage with the stakeholders to analyse the steps taken or proposed to mitigate the noise issues arising from aircraft operations. The case study is bounded within the analysis of land-use and zoning around airports.

Objective

To reduce the aviation noise and noise annoyance of the communities around Iasi Airport.

Approach

The construction of a new runway (RWY14/32 for departures and arrivals) was selected as a measure within the first Action Plan, further developed by Iasi Airport in order to modify the direction of flight so that surrounding communities will become less overflown.

1. Development of noise annoyance studies (2015). Results have shown that noise exposure would only increase as the years go by;
2. Construction of a new runway was selected as an approach to tackle the noise exposure above the communities living around the airport – redirecting the airport noise further from the communities;
3. Studying of ICAO Balanced Approach pillars;
4. Starting to engage with numerous stakeholders – airlines, ministries, local and regional authorities;
5. The conclusion was reached – there is a need for a properly-defined policy on land-use planning, which was unavailable at that moment. Territorial planning was at the hands of City Halls and airports had no involvement in the development of urban plans, therefore, the aviation noise effect did not have enough consideration in the plans;
6. The dialogue was initiated between local and regional authorities and Iasi Airport on understanding the noise impact of the new runway on communities around the airport and finding solutions together on reducing impact and preventing noise exposure situations in/around the communities;
7. After one official meeting, a new legislative change was proposed, empowering the status of the previous transposition of END from Governmental Decision to Law. This change was determined by the need to ensure a better understanding of noise management and to highlight the importance of collaboration between all relevant stakeholders during the noise mitigation process;
8. Various other stakeholders became officially responsible for airport noise management, compared to the previous situation when only the airport was in charge.

After the steps mentioned above were taken, further experiences and research of Iasi Airport on land-use planning implementation in other European Airports within ANIMA Project led to conclude that collaboration between relevant stakeholders is key to apply efficient noise management measures, as well as communication with other European Airports, is needed to learn from their challenges and best practices.

Even if some provisions have been introduced within the National legislative framework, a specific policy on land-use planning and management is still necessary. In other words, land-use planning must become a legal, mandatory practice. In addition, guidance for ensuring a proper understanding and application of land-use planning and management is needed for all stakeholders.

The case study also found out that more specific training on both awareness and understanding of the noise issue is needed, especially for airport representatives, all relevant stakeholders and communities.