While I'm in complete agreement on people's obliviousness and belated outrage.....
I will add a caveat.
I certainly couldn't live in close proximity to the airport flight path. I would find the noise quite disturbing.
Here's the thing. Many of the homes now located so close to the airport were on land originally designated as non-residential, expressly because of that.
I'm old enough to remember the fight Mississauga had to allow residential closer to the airport.
It wasn't wise. Buffer Zones are there for a reason.
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I would add that for railways or highways (or airports), while people should anticipate growth in capacity, so should governments.
As one example, I don't imagine the original 401 design contemplated a 16-lane cross-section at all. (I could stand to be corrected)
But when built as a 4-lane highway, people might have imagined it would one day be 6 or even 8 lanes., with a substantial vegetative buffer.
Today, the cross-section allows no buffer in many places.
That is, at best, poor design.
I'm also not entirely sure I'd expect someone to foresee that change.
Yes, municipalities in this province have in numerous instances inappropriately rezoned lands to permit sensitive uses near transportation infrastructure, particularly before the PPS was tightened up to ostensibly prevent such conflicts. The City of Toronto is better these days, but still does it on those occasions when politics overcome good planning and common sense (Mimico-Judson lands). (And ironically, the City also still often fights residential intensification near transportation infrastructure where it *would* be appropriate).
It's an issue for employment lands too. Industrial users are also far too familiar with the old routine: developer proposes residential rezoning near noisy/smelly industrial use, industrial user objects, City says "don't worry, be happy", townhouses get built, as predicted new homeowners start to complain about the noisy/smelly industrial use, Toronto Star provides some one-sided coverage, local Councillor blames the industrial user (conveniently forgetting past commitments and statements), industrial user faces barrage of regulatory problems. And repeat. Again and again. Then City staff do another report on City's shrinking industrial employment base (entitled "What happened?").
As for foreseeing change, I think anyone who moves near transportation infrastructure, whether its an airport, a rail corridor, or even an arterial road characterized mainly by one and two storey buildings, is naive to think that (in a growing and changing city) that the use of that infrastructure will remain the same. Or that nobody is going to build anything taller than two storeys on that arterial road.
Even if transportation planners and government in the 1950s and 1960s did think the 401 would never expand beyond 8 lanes, one would have to be completely blind to think that's a solid prediction for the future. "yep, 8-lane limit, forever and ever, cast in stone." Same with other transportation links.
Joking aside, I have some sympathy for those east-enders living near the rail corridor who are calling for some noise mitigation barriers. As a city and region, we can make more effective use of our transportation links while also taking reasonable steps to improve health and safety.
I lose all sympathy, however, for those east-enders who claim that they had some legitimate expectation that the use of that rail corridor would not change. Such incredible bullshit. The use of that corridor, and the traffic using it, has continued to evolve since it was first built. But as with the rest of this evolving city, one of the key aspects of NIMBYism is ignoring the past and pretending that the current situation is not only the best situation, but what has always existed.
