A 225-foot-tall NFL stadium proposed by the Raiders would not pose a hazard to commercial jetliners and military aircraft flying through Las Vegas, according to a final report issued Tuesday by the Federal Aviation Administration.

The finding clears the way for the Clark County Commission to consider zoning permits Wednesday for the 65,000-seat domed stadium. The venue, estimated at $1.9 billion, is slated for a vacant 62-acre plot of land on Russell Road, just west of Interstate 15 and roughly 1½ miles from the nation’s eighth-busiest airport.

“From what I saw and heard leading up to this, I knew that there would be no substantive problems with the height, and that any issues could be solved or addressed pretty easily,” Clark County Commission Chairman Steve Sisolak said.

The Raiders did not respond to requests for comment.The FAA preliminarily cleared the stadium’s height requirement Aug. 16 and set a Sept. 22 deadline to submit public comments, which would have delayed the county’s ability to consider zoning permits.

Two days later, the FAA shortened the public comment period by three weeks to help keep construction on schedule so that the stadium can open in time for the 2020 NFL season.

The only comment filed by the deadline came from the Air Line Pilots Association International, which raised concerns that reflective materials used to build the stadium, high-intensity floodlights and a large, animated video screen could “severely impact” the vision of pilots coming in for a landing at McCarran International Airport.

The FAA agreed with the concerns raised by the association, which represents more than 57,000 pilots at 33 airlines in the United States and Canada. However, the FAA’s obstruction evaluation process solely concentrated on how the stadium’s height might affect visual procedures, radar, radio navigation and communications.

 

Source:reviewjournal.com

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