Proficient Pilot: Saving Our Future

There were no gates or fences to limit where I could ride my bike, no verboten signs banning this or that. It was a friendly, welcoming place. Little wonder that I soon found myself standing on the edge of a taxiway with an outstretched arm, a thumb pointed skyward, and an imploring look on my face whenever an airplane taxied by.

My attempt at aerial hitchhiking was eventually rewarded. Ed Grant saw the enthusiasm on my teenage face and took me up in his Beech Bonanza, my first flight in a lightplane, and an experience that propelled me into a career.

That airport, now called Santa Monica Municipal Airport (SMO), became my “home” for half a century. It was the center of my world. It was where I and thousands of others became pilots and developed our love of flight. It was my Disneyland, the happiest place on Earth.

Then came the 1970s, which were explosive for general aviation. More airplanes were built and more civilian pilots trained than at any other time. Santa Monica Airport became so busy—it was the busiest single-runway airport in the world—that it was not uncommon to be sequenced number 12 for landing or for the downwind leg to extend for 10 miles. We were so exuberant in those days that we failed to notice dark clouds forming on the political horizon.

Despite the airport’s popularity, the city of Santa Monica announced in 1978 that it no longer wanted an airport. The reasons, both political and economic, were detailed in my feature article “Death of an Airport” (August 1981 AOPA Pilot). The city council declared a war of attrition against the airport by imposing Draconian regulations and refusing to renew leases.

A group of pilots and other airport users formed the Santa Monica Airport Association to unify and focus our outrage and energy, to react with creative activism. During one of our first meetings, I began a presentation by saying, “Welcome to the People’s Republic of Santa Monica.” It was something that just popped out. Our president at the time, Jim Barton, said, “Hey, that would make a great bumper sticker.” Our group agreed, and we had some printed.

A few weeks later and during the wee hours of a foggy night in Santa Monica, at least several hundred such bumper stickers were plastered all over the city (including the airport). They found their way onto traffic signs, store windows, municipal offices, the police chief’s car, the mayor’s car (as well as her home), and wherever else one can imagine placing a bumper sticker.

For some inexplicable reason, the Santa Monica Police Department thought the airport to be the source of the bumper stickers. Detectives crawled all over Santa Monica Airport during the following week in an attempt to find those responsible for “defacing public property.”

But the conspirators were thankfully never found. Some of the flight schools, however, were selling the bright red bumper stickers. When asked by the police for the source of these stickers, one FBO simply said that “they were a gift from heaven.” Some of the bumper stickers were even sold in Oshkosh that summer.

News of this clandestine operation and—more important—the reason for it spread nationally and helped to pressure the FAA into becoming more seriously involved in saving Santa Monica Municipal Airport. The city ultimately caved in and formally agreed to keep the airport open until at least 2015, which is when the city once again felt free to wage war against its airport. Despite the recently reached détente, the battle to save the airport is not over.

As I wrote 36 years ago, “although it might appear that the death knell for SMO is once again sounding, the airport continues to breathe, and where there is life, there is hope.”

Web: www.barryschiff.com