Dallas, TX Noise from Specific Sources: Airport Engine Run-up (2026)

Sec. 5-34, in Article V (Operations and Security) of Chapter 5, Aircraft and Airports, sets two separate rules. First, it is unlawful to start and run up an aircraft anywhere except in a location designated for that purpose by the director of aviation or one of the director's assistants; this applies at every city-operated airport, not just Love Field. m. Third, a safety rule applies at all times regardless of the curfew: no person may run up an engine or engines from a position where hangars, shops, or other buildings, or any person in an observation area, sit in the path of the propeller or jet blast.

The section traces to Ordinance Nos. 8213, 9975, 14384 and 31690, showing it has been carried forward and amended across the city's Clean Air and airport-operations rewrites rather than freshly enacted. Enforcement sits with the Dallas Department of Aviation's operations and security division, the same division Sec. 5-33 assigns primary responsibility for the airport security program generally. The run-up curfew works alongside, not instead of, the FAA's own noise-abatement procedures at Love Field; the city ordinance is the local backstop that lets code enforcement or airport staff act on a run-up violation directly rather than waiting on federal action.