A serious aircraft noise problem exists today primarily for one simple reason—aeroplanes make too much noise. The problem could be solved just as simply by getting rid of the aeroplanes, but aircraft have proved to be useful and, in most cases, even profitable investments. In the past few years, air transportation has become so widely used that it is now considered essential to the economic and social welfare of the citizen, as well as to the national defence of the United States, so some other solution must be found, one which assures the orderly development of air commerce, but which also recognises the rights of people on the ground who are adversely affected by the undesirable social by–products of this rapidly advancing technology.