City reaches deal with FAA over Meigs Field

The Daley administration agreed Monday to pay a $33,000 fine - and repay $1 million in federal airport development grants - to settle claims stemming from Mayor Daley's infamous midnight destruction of Meigs Field in March, 2003

Steve Whitney, president of Friends of Meigs Field, applauded the FAA for holding the city's feet to the fire by requiring them to pay the full amount of the fine imposed for violating the notice requirement.

Congress has since made the fine 10 times as high because they never want this to happen again, Whitney said.

The city put pilots and the flying public at risk by the way they did this. There were aircraft inbound to Meigs Field that morning. If anyone had been low on fuel, it could have been a tragedy, he said

(from Chicago Sun-Times).