Apr. 19—The Niagara Falls Planning Board is expected to approve a rezoning request from the operator of Rainbow Air to move operations from a downtown helipad to a property adjacent to the former Carborundum Center on Buffalo Avenue.
The move will allow the helicopter tour company to expand its operations including the addition of an entertainment center that will feature 15 3-D flight simulators The architect overseeing the project told the Planning Board they "hope to start construction this summer on the heliport facility."
Rainbow Air, which was established in 1995, had operated its tours from a landing pad near the Niagara River gorge. The tour company said that location required an inconvenient take-off procedure and was the source of noise complaints from some South End residents and businesses.
That location has now been abandoned and the company will operate during the 2023 tourist season from a base at the Niagara Falls International Airport, near the Niagara Aerospace Museum.
The proposed project, dubbed the Rainbow Air Tourism Center, will be accessed off of Acheson Drive from Buffalo Avenue. The site includes room for three choppers and a helipad, as well as an outdoor dining area and parking for both cars and buses. The tour company said they are aggressively marketing the project to tour operators around the world.
The single-story tourism center will have a hangar for aircraft maintenance, a flight heritage center that will highlight the role of the Falls in the history and development of flight, a retail sales area and the flight simulator stations that will allow individuals to have the experience of flying a helicopter over the falls.
A company spokesperson said they were looking to create "a new entertainment center for the city, for both tourists and residents."
The project architect told the Planning Board members that the new location was chosen to allow the company's helicopters "a quick departure to the south, over the Niagara River" which will allow the aircraft to "climb to altitude quickly and minimize noise." The flight path of the helicopters in and around the Falls is tightly controlled by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and Air Transport Canada.
Rainbow Air officials said they have conducted studies that show that the noise from departing helicopters at the new site is no greater than the noise of trucks operating on Buffalo Avenue.
"We sought to minimize noise downtown by moving here," the project architect told the board. "We wanted to bring entertainment to the area and we have heard for years that the noise downtown was bothersome."
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