Heard to fight Gwinnett airport plans

LAWRENCEVILLE- One of the newest members of the Gwinnett County Commission says he will ask that the county drop the controversial idea of opening up the county's airport o commercial flights.

John Heard now represents the district which includes Briscoe Field.

Though he wants plans for commercial traffic at the airport scrapped, Heard tells the Atlanta Journal-Constitution he will wait until a new commission chairman is elected this spring to press the idea. Heard wants the airport to remain for general aviation use only.

Gwinnett has been studying the possibility of leasing the airport to a private entity for some time now and commercial flights have been part of that plan... which has been met with strong opposition from people who live near the airport.