FAA officials are clarifying a recent guidance letter on Through The Fence operations, according to a post at the Airport Business blog, which notes that the primary focus of the crackdown is resident developments.

The blog quotes Randall Fiertz, director of airport compliance and field operations at the FAA, as saying:

“There are a couple of reasons why we don’t like through-the-fence residential. One is, we’ve had cases where we’ve seen that a through-the-fence agreement undermines the future capacity capability of the airport, where certain rights have been given in perpetuity or for very long periods of time. It may be a taxiway for the through-the-fence agreement that blocks airport development. We’ve seen residential hangars go up in places where it actually blocked the line of sight from the tower.

“The other problem is, if an airport operator allows residential through-the-fence, we’re concerned that it undermines their future capability of restricting residential development next to the airport. If the airport gives the OK for one type of residential — and we understand why people in aviation might want that — if someone else then wants to build a development on the other side of the airport, it undermines the ability to say ‘no’.”

Read the full blog here.