si Ss Erhard BMW RIFTY IN PRICE BUT Pie In The Sky? 'For three decades, bureaucracy and red tape have dogged attempts to move Sde Dov Airport. Can new plans succeed? NOT IN FEATURES NICKY BLACKBURN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS S '97 BMW 318ti ,,,,,,,,,,,,, ,,• . • ,,,,,,,,,,,, • • . , THE DETROIT JEWIS H NEWS Some Ads 0 er What Appears To Be A Very Low Price. But When You Look Closer The Low Price Is On A Car That Is Also Low In Equipment. Not So, Here! a '64 4065 Maple Just E. of Telegraph Bloomfield Hills Erhard BMW 642-6565 Michigan's Largest and Most Experienced BM W Dealer Family Owned and Operated Since 1964 OPEN SATURDAY SALES 10 A.M.-4 P.M. SERVICE/PARTS/SALES Mon. - Thurs. 'til 9 p.m. *36 month dosed end lease subject to approved credit with BMWFS. 52500 non-refundable down payment required. Title, license and use tax additional. A security deposit of $300.00 For 318ti. 10,000 miles per year limit, 15 cents per mile over limit. Option to purchase at lease end of 515,283.80 for 318ti. Total payments equal to ad price + 6% x 36. Vehicle subject to availability and may need to be or- dered. Scheduled Maintenance provided by BMW of North America for a period of 36 months or 36,000 miles. Offer ends May 31, 1997. hiri Meyer looked out of the window of her expensive apartment in Tel Aviv's Azorei Hen neighborhood as the noise of an airplane filled the room, halting conversation temporarily. "It's so busy tonight," she sighed as the airplane finally landed on the runway at Sde Dov Airport and the noise died down. "They said they were going to move it, but nothing ever seems to hap- pen." Ms. Meyer is right. For 32 years there have been plans to move the military and civilian airport from its position sandwiched between the power station and Tel Baruch in the north of Tel Aviv to a new man-made site off the coast. Some claim Sde Dov is dan- gerous, others cite pollution prob- lems and lack of space. Some are just looking greedily at the 500 acres of land it sits on. Over the years, however, nothing has been done. Instead, plan after plan has fallen victim to bureaucracy, lethargy and sheer bad luck. Moving an airport to an off- shore island — man-made or nat- ural — is nothing new. There are 170 airports like this around the world, from Chicago to Japan and Rio De Janeiro, and the advan- tages are obvious. Not only are these airports safer because planes land and take-off over wa- ter, but noise pollution is reduced enormously and there are no night-time noise restrictions which means the airport can op- erate 24-hours-a-day. "In most countries, it takes an average of 25 years to plan and build an airport. In Israel, it's al- ready taken three decades and we haven't even reached the planning stage," complains Hugo Marom, founder and CEO of Airport En- gineering Hugo Mamm Ltd., who was first commissioned to design the Sde Dov airport in 1965. To- day he has a new $750 million de- sign which, he says, with government support could go out for bids in 12-18 months. The government set up an in- ter ministerial committee in March to look into feasibility. Promising though this might sound, there are already signs that feet are still being dragged. Sde Dov was never meant to be a permanent airport. Built on land expropriated by the British au- thorities during World War II, it was always assumed that it would be handed back to residents. That did not happen, and it was only in 1965 that the Israeli gov- ernment first began to explore moving the airport. Initially, the aim was to find a cheaper location somewhere near Tel Aviv. Nine- teen sites were examined, but the only viable option was to build on land reclaimed from the sea. The first design, by Mr. Marom, fell through. Undaunted, he car- ried on campaigning for the move and in the early 1970s was again commissioned to draw up anoth- er design for an offshore airport. In 1973, the Transport Ministry approved Mr. Marom's plan to build a municipal, domestic and regional airport adjoining the mainland. The project, for a sin- gle offshore runway, went out for international bids, but when the Yom Kippur War broke out. It took another 10 years for the airport to be put back on the agen- da. This time, Marom designed a plan for moving the airport to a rocky area north of Tel Baruch in order to free up the beach. Though Mr. Marom brought with him pri- vate investors interested in de- veloping the airport, this plan and another in the early 1990s was re- jected. This year, Transport Minister Yitzhak Levy proposed moving the airport to an island. The idea is part of a wider plan by Nation- al Infrastructure Minister Ariel Sharon to construct a string of is- lands opposite Israel's major coastal cities. The government committee is expected to produce an interim report in six months. "We want to move Sde Dov to the sea in the long run, but need to examine costs and feasibility. I don't know many details at pre- sent," says Nahoum Langental, head of the committee and direc- tor-general of the Transport Min- istry. Mr. Marom's latest, $750 mil- lion plan proposes an island air- port a half-mile off the coast between Tel Baruch and Herzylia Marina in 45 feet of water. Cov- ering either 500 to 750 acres of land, depending on whether the terminal is onshore or offshore, the airport would have a main runway and taxiways, one of which would serve as an emer- gency runway. With these facilities, the airport could service up to 40 million pas- sengers per year, and up to 600- 700 takeoffs and landings a day. There will also be facilities for small aircraft, military aircraft and helicopters. Bridges or tun- nels would most probably be used