Residents who live near the busy heliport on East 34th Street fought hard to get a curfew imposed in 1998, prohibiting landing and taking off on nights and weekends. Of course, such trivial things as noise and air pollution shouldn't stop important plutocrats from going about their business. In the last six months, nearby resident Ron Sticco and his wife have caught the mayor's helicopter breaking curfew sixteen times.
And those are just the instances the Sticcos happened to be around to witness. During this past weekend alone, Bloomberg's helicopter was in and out of the heliport eight times. According to press releases from the mayor's office, Bloomberg had no public events planned this weekend, aside from a routine radio address on Sunday. Nevertheless, the Sticcos caught him on video landing the helicopter again and again, including one instance with his lady friend and her dogs. Hey, she's got to get them to the dog run somehow!
The heliport's chart given to pilots clearly states the heliport is closed on weekends. A reporter for ABC 7 confronted the mayor this week, and Bloomberg—who often flies the helicopters himself—denied any knowledge of any stinking curfew. "It's not closed on the weekend," Bloomberg told ABC 7. "I've been using it. I have a lot of things to do. I'm trying like everybody else. And the heliport is there, it's available to land and take off from, and you can't get other surfaces. Thank you very much."
"He's being a little bit hypocritical," says Sticco. "If you're concerned about the quality of life of the citizen in this city, like don't smoke a cigarette in Central Park, then don't land a two thousand pound helicopter in front of my apartment with the choking exhaust and intolerable noise when it's closed." Two thousand pounds? That's nothing—wait until Bloomberg gets his hands on that AgustaWestland AW609 Tiltrotor. Hope you like Wagner, Sticco!
