Saturday, September 20, 2008

The roar.

September 20, Elk Grove Village.

The planes have been a constant presence since we've arrived in the Chicago area but here in Elk Grove Village, which sits directly west of O'Hare airport, it's more of a constant roar. Outside the trailer this morning watching the kids play I counted an airplane passing overhead every thirty seconds.
Anything more intense than that is hard to imagine but up to 2005 O'Hare International Airport was the busiest in the world in terms of traffic. That year the U.S. government put limits to the number of flights the airport could handle in order to reduce delays and the airport in Atlanta, Hartsfield-Jackson International, became the world's biggest.
There are plans to expand O'Hare and not surprisingly Elk Grove Village, this perfectly neat, tree-lined suburbia, is opposing them forcefully.

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