Firm partner David Bannard recently published a paper with The Journal of Airport Management examining the growing importance of ESG disclosure in the aviation industry, with specific focus on airports. This publication aims to familiarize airport managers and other stakeholders with the fundamental concepts behind ESG and shed light on the implications of these factors for airports by exploring the external impacts of airport operations on the environment and affected communities, as well as the entity’s compliance within its regulated environment. 

Click here to read the publication.

The collapse in U.S. air traffic during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic illustrates the speed with which a severe public health emergency can devastate the air travel industry. It further illustrates how quickly an airport operator may have to react to a public health crisis. In the TRB Airport Cooperative Research Program’s ACRP Legal Research Digest 44: Airports Responding to Public Health Emergencies: Legal Considerations, Firm attorneys Peter Kirsch and Adam Gerchick discuss potential legal issues that airport sponsors and other stakeholders in the airport industry could confront as they address a future public health emergency.

Firm attorneys Suzanne Silverman, Adam Giuliano, Ayelet Hirschkorn, Emily Eads, Christian Alexander, and Brandon Rattiner identify and analyze legal challenges that have resulted from, or are related to, the implementation of transit mega projects in Transit Mega Projects: Legal Issues.

Drawing on general research and experience, as well as specific examples from five mega projects, the digest seeks to introduce attorneys to the special or legal issues that such mega projects face, and to provide considerations and potential solutions by way of examples from past projects.
The five projects relied on in particular are:

1. Colorado Eagle P3 Project;
2. Transforming Rail in Virginia Initiative;
3. The California High-Speed Rail Project;
4. Sound Transit’s East Link Extension Project; and
5. The Hudson-Bergen Light Rail Project.

The digest includes lessons learned from transit agencies that have overseen federally funded complex mega projects, such as insights from reviewing third-party contracts and intergovernmental agreements, FTA guidance, pertinent legal decisions, and other valuable references. The digest also covers lessons learned from the above case studies and summarizes legal issues these mega transit projects faced, including funding, environmental challenges, contracts, design, insurance, dispute resolution, and intergovernmental coordination.

We are pleased to share Kaplan Kirsch & Rockwell’s Airport Law Digest – 2022 Year in Review. 

This Airport Law Digest includes a list of principal cases decided over the past year; new DOT and FAA rules, policies, and guidance; and reports, studies, and articles of interest to airport legal professionals.  We have attempted to provide links to publicly available documents, and most other documents are available via subscription services such as Westlaw or LexisNexis. 

We hope you find this Digest useful in your efforts to remain current in the always-evolving legal and regulatory framework that governs airports. If you have questions about any of the materials in this Digest, please contact editors Nicholas M. Clabbers and Adam Gerchick, or any other Kaplan Kirsch & Rockwell attorney who normally represents you.

This paper has been developed in collaboration with the American Association of Airport Executives (AAAE) and was prepared by contributing advisory members of the Airport Consortium on Consumer Trust (ACT) Program’s Finance Working Group, led by Kaplan Kirsch & Rockwell, EY, Steer, and the Minneapolis-St Paul International Airport. Its goal is to provide a simple, easy-to-follow catalogue of key business terms and provisions in airport concessions contracts, which can be used by airport managers throughout the United States regardless of airport size, location, or organizational structure. This paper should provide sufficient context and background to allow airport decision-makers to be informed business partners, capable of “asking the right questions,” and exploring the best alternatives and contractual structures for their specific airport. It is critical to note that each airport’s position will be unique and will inevitably require the consideration of many historical precedents, local market influences, legal and commercial legacy agreements, consumer preferences, and market demand, to name a few. For this reason, this paper should not be viewed as a complete guide to preparing any airport manager for a full and final concession agreement negotiation. This paper also reflects on more recent changes in the contracting environment since the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic and seeks to highlight preliminary lessons learned, though we note the industry continues to evolve as passenger traffic and the health of the industry improve.

The firm is pleased to announce the publication of the Handbook of Public Private Partnerships in Transportation in which our partner, Peter Kirsch, and former law clerk, Andrew Fisher, contributed the chapter on the challenges for airport P3 development in the United States. 

Electronic or hard copies of the textbook can be ordered from the publisher here.

Kirsch P.J., Fischer A.C. (2022) Legal Impediments to Airport P3s in the United States. In: Hakim S., Clark R.M., Blackstone E.A. (eds) Handbook on Public Private Partnerships in Transportation, Vol I. Competitive Government: Public Private Partnerships. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-83484-5_6