Sunday marked Kayla Briska’s third day as the Hampton Hopper’s “ambassador,” or chaperone, but already she had witnessed a woman urinate outside the bus and dealt with two disoriented teenagers unable to find the stop. She met people from Miami, danced beneath the Hopper’s flashing strobe lights, and waved out the window when she spied previous riders on the street the next day.

“I love it here. Right? You’re my best friend!” she joked to Karin Gosman, the bus driver, who’s back for her second year with the Hopper.

The duo wore matching, cuffed Hampton Hopper T-shirts in a bold aquamarine, the same hue as the well-known Hopper party bus that has a “dance floor” in place of seats and arouses late-night boogying. That day, though, the women drove in the one other bus the company owns. Ms. Briska, who is 19, described it as the “friend” bus where passengers connect and converse. Palm tree prints adorn the ceiling and wrap around the cobalt exterior. Stickers remind passengers of its hashtag, #thehopper. Otherwise, thisHopper is a regular school bus equipped with paper towels and a broom.

Derek Kleinow, 33, launched the Hampton Hopper last summer after years of frustration with the East End’s lack of affordable transportation, particularly for medium-haul trips like East Hampton to Montauk where taxi prices can reach $100 each way. He grew up in Westchester, but has a house in Southampton. Unfortunately for him, the Hopper only loops from Sag Harbor down to East Hampton and westward to Montauk with stops in between at popular hangouts like Cyril’s and, starting this week, @Bernie’s, on the Napeague stretch.

He wants to add more destinations, expand the fleet and eventually run 18 hours a day with a bus arriving every 30 minutes. Right now, it takes about 90 minutes to complete an entire circle, and interruptions like traffic, the crew’s bathroom breaks, and unexpected hails or drop-offs can disrupt the schedule. Mr. Kleinow rationalized that the start-up is still in its first phase and will evolve as demand grows.

“We had hoped to have more vehicles, but it’s been a slow ramp up,” he said, and the budget is a small one.

The Hopper costs $12 for a one-way ride, $20 for an unlimited day pass and $99 for a summer pass. It runs Friday through Sunday, from about 10 a.m. to 2 a.m. on Saturday and until 11 p.m. on Sunday. 

Mr. Kleinow’s biggest challenge has been marketing the business, but the buses’ eye-popping paint jobs serve as the best tool of all. Sometimes when Ms. Gosman drives slowly, people will trot alongside the vehicle while simultaneously filming on their cellphones.

When the bus rolled into Amagansett around 5 p.m. Sunday, it parked behind Mary’s Marvelous since it can’t block traffic on Montauk Highway. Two men, obviously regulars because they knowingly waited at the unmarked stop, walked on and Ms. Gosman excitedly stood up.

“Hey, how are you, Bobby? How’s the fam?” she asked, embracing the first passenger, a bony man with tanned skin and white scars spattered on his right arm. He wore a backwards cap over his long, brown locks. Bobby, who is 28 and declined to give his last name because he said he is awaiting trial, introduced his cousin, Nick Gaviola. Mr. Gaviola, 21, still had plastic blue star beads hanging around his neck from the night before and wore a camouflage fishing hat. They both grew up and live in Springs.

Ms. Briska offered their only riders Vita Coco coconut water, whose logo is stamped on the bus’s outside, from a cooler with the choice of peach, lemonade, mango, and plain. They paid in cash instead of with the iPhone app, which charges upon purchase, not at boarding when an ambassador scans the barcode. The men told Ms. Gosman they needed a lift to Montauk to retrieve Mr. Gaviola's car.

They chatted about how much the Hopper has helped cut back on the prevalent drunken-driving arrests here.

“At least they found a way to help people,” Mr. Gaviola said. They griped however that the bus only runs until 2 a.m., the time their night starts, not ends.

The bus bounced along Montauk Highway and idled next to the Lobster Roll before moving on with no new passengers. Ms. Gosman weaved through downtown Montauk and dropped the men off at the Royal Atlantic Beach Resort to find their parked car. She then drove a few blocks west to the Montauk Beach House. The owner, Larry Siedlick, briskly walked over and leaned against the opened door.

“It was up two nights with a nice metal sign and someone stole it!” he exclaimed about a Hopper lawn sign wedged into a grassy patch out front. The post exists, Mr. Siedlick said, because he supports young entrepreneurs and asked for it. The only other Hopper post is in front of @Bernie’s.

Mr. Siedlick believes, “any service that takes cars off of the road during the tourist season is automatically a good thing in my mind.”

Ms. Gosman waited for about three minutes before leaving with an empty bus once again. Mr. Kleinow declined to give rider numbers but claims every week this year has proven busier than the same one a year ago.

“There was one situation last summer where a bus was at capacity,” he said, acknowledging that was a rare occurrence that has not yet been repeated.

Ms. Briska guessed the quiet day might be a function of people recovering from the Fourth of July. But as the bus inched through traffic in front of the Surf Lodge, cabs jammed the streets, bouncers lined the entrance, and another bus inadvertently parked in the Hopper’s spot. Groups of partygoers in breezy sundresses, linen shirts, and polarized Ray Bans spilled out from the road’s shoulder on their way to the St. Lucia concert. The blue bus streaked by without stopping and finished its lonely Montauk round devoid of riders.

Every few minutes Ms. Briska checked the company’s Twitter for messages and the app’s GPS tracking system to locate the other bus. The timetables on the app lag, and the small bus icons moving along Google Maps seem more reliable both for Hopper employees and people wondering about arrivals. Ms. Gosman also gives out the bus’s phone number and people often utilize it.

Golden light touched the horizon as the Hopper whizzed past the Hither Hills overlook on its way back west. Ms. Briska kept talking about the characters she had encountered from faraway places.

She swayed her copper hair that reached down her back and sang a line from a Michael Buble song: “I just haven’t met you yet.”

Ms. Gosman honked her horn as she drove through East Hampton and the women headed toward Sag Harbor to begin another round, and another and another, until their shifts ended at 10 p.m.

Correction: The car that Bobby and Nick Gaviola needed to retrieve belonged to Mr. Gaviola, not Bobby, as previously reported.

Update, July 6, 4:04 p.m.: The bicyclist who was seriously injured when he was struck by a car on the Napeague Stretch Sunday afternoon may have tried to cross the street, East Hampton Town police said. 

Captain Chris Anderson said David Disick, 77, of East Hampton, was riding his bicycle east in the westbound shoulder, facing traffic, when he "suddenly attempted to travel across the lanes." A 2015 GMC, driven by Joseph Moleti of Nesconset hit Mr. Disick in front of the Lobster Roll, near Beach Plum Court, at 12:12 p.m. 

Captain Anderson was not sure if Mr. Disick had been wearing a helmet, but did note bicyclists are supposed to ride with the flow of traffic instead of against it. 

Mr. Disick was flown to Stony Brook University Hospital, where he is listed in critical condition, a hospital spokeswoman said.

No citations were issued to Mr. Moleti or Mr. Disick. 

Originally, July 5, 1:10 p.m: A bicyclist was seriously injured after being struck by a vehicle on the Napeague Stretch Sunday afternoon. 

The crash occurred in front of the Lobster Roll restaurant on Montauk Highway, east of Dolphin Drive, at about 12:15 p.m. The Amagansett Fire Department's ambulance crew treated the bicyclist and transported their patient to the former 555 property to meet a medevac helicopter. The bicyclist was airlifted to Stony Brook University Hospital, the nearest trauma center, with a possible head injury. 

In the midst of the busy Fourth of July weekend, traffic on the Stretch between Montauk and Amagansett was briefly stopped in both directions because there are no side roads in that area to bypass that stretch of Montauk Highway. As of 1 p.m., traffic had been reopened in both directions, according to police.

It was unclear what caused the accident. East Hampton Town police are investigating the accident. 

A minivan involved a two-car crash on Cedar Street in East Hampton on Monday morning briefly burst into flames.

The accident took place between Stephen Hand's Path and Old Orchard Lane at about 8:25 a.m. Traffic was diverted for a time.

The East Hampton Fire Department responded with two engines, Second Assistant Chief Gerard Turza Jr. said. When firefighters arrived, they found a flames under the hood of the minivan, which was pressed against the driver's side door of a pickup truck. Firefighters quickly extinguished the flames. All of the occupants were out of the vehicles before the first emergency personnel arrived on the scene.

Two people were taken to Southampton Hospital with minor injuries. Two East Hampton Village Ambulance Association ambulances transported the patients.

It wasn't immediately clear what cause the accident. After the vehicles were towed away, East Hampton Town police reopened the road to traffic.

The East Hampton Airport was busy, but not overly so, on Monday morning after the first weekend of an overnight curfew on flights — a holiday weekend to boot.

The decision by East Hampton Town, which owns the airport, to close the airport overnight in response to complaints about aircraft noise was challenged in federal court, but a judge's ruling paved the way for the nighttime closures, which took effect on July 2. The new rules prompted an outcry from aviation businesses and other opponents, but did not seem to cause much turbulence at the airport, at least in their first few days.

Late morning on Monday, Jemille Charlton, the airport manager, summed up: "It was very smooth; uneventful."

Supervisor Larry Cantwell and Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, the town board's airport liaison, were in the operations center overlooking the tarmac at 9 a.m. Monday as the curfew on flights by "noisy" aircraft was about to be lifted. A half-dozen or so seaplanes stood waiting for passengers, their pilots performing pre-flight checks. There was no queue of helicopters waiting to take off, nor any circling in a holding pattern, waiting for the magic hour when they could land.

A few minutes after 9, a couple of helicopters took off. The morning "rush" was over, and the tarmac virtually clear, by 9:45.

Data on the exact number of takeoffs and landings over the long weekend had not yet been compiled, but traffic was "pretty on par for a Fourth of July weekend," said Mr. Charlton. On Sunday, he said, there was "a steady flow." And at 7 a.m. Monday, as the overnight curfew expired for less noisy aircraft, Mr. Charlton said that "there wasn't any big, 'All right, the light switch went on ... curfew's ended; let's get in there!' "

He did notice over the weekend, though, that some pilots with flights scheduled close to curfew hours seemed to be feeling the pinch of the restriction. "You can see their anxiety goes up," Mr. Charlton said, "40 minutes before they have to leave, and their passengers haven't arrived yet."

Aircraft that are rated "noisy," based on a decibel measure used by the F.A.A. and including many helicopters, can no longer take off or land here between 8 p.m. and 9 a.m. For aircraft that fall below the noise threshold, the curfew is 11 p.m. to 7 a.m.

There had been some concern, Ms. Burke-Gonzalez said, that quieter helicopters not subject to the extended curfew would depart East Hampton as soon as possible, at 7 in the morning, fly to New York City, and zoom back to the airport to pick up more passengers just at 9. That could create a traffic jam, with choppers wanting to land just as aircraft waiting for the 9 a.m. all-clear were ready to take off. But that didn't happen.

Aviators got word of the curfew in several ways, Mr. Charlton said. The Federal Aviation Administration's flight safety district office was notified; a notice was sent to area airports; some pilots were contacted by email, and the airport's fixed-base operators — the aviation businesses based there — informed their customers.

The Eastern Region Helicopter Council, a trade group, was "very instrumental" in getting the message out to its members, said the airport manager. And, he said, an alert about flight restrictions is included in the airport information for pilots, so that those doing their "due diligence" will be advised to check with the airport office.

Jeff Smith, the chairman of the helicopter council, sat down at a table in the airport operations center on Monday morning. He was back and forth from his home base in New Jersey several times over the weekend, he said, monitoring how things were going at the airport, "to see how we could do better." He echoed Mr. Charlton's assessment that it had largely been smooth sailing.

Information about noise complaints prompted by aircraft flying within the designated hours over the holiday weekend was still being compiled early Monday. But Mr. Charlton said he "did get a lot of voicemails from people who are pretty agitated at the traffic."

Those affected by noise, who had anticipated the impact of another law adopted by the town -- a one-round-trip-per-week limit on noisy aircraft -- were disappointed by Judge Joanne Seybert's decision to enjoin the implementation of that rule and were perhaps, Mr. Charlton suggested, expressing more aggravation than usual about the daylong air traffic.

Judge Seybert, of Federal District Court in Central Islip, ruled on June 26 that the overnight curfew was justified, to control noise, but ruled that the plaintiffs -- a group of aviation companies, along with an organization called Friends of the East Hampton Airport — had shown their businesses could be harmed if the once-a-week limit was enacted.

The lawsuit will now go to trial, and it could be a long time before the ultimate outcome is determined.

A Patchogue woman was taken to Southampton Hospital on Monday afternoon after being thrown from a Schwinn moped she was riding on South Emerson Avenue in Montauk.

The name of 34-year-old victim was not available from East Hampton Town police.

Two police officers stationed in Montauk, along with Vincent Franzone, the first assistant chief of the Montauk Fire Department, were among the first on the scene, and treated the victim in the back of a police department vehicle before the arrival of an ambulance. Emergency medical technicians took over treatment of the woman, who suffered multiple abrasions and complained of having difficulty breathing.

The accident occurred outside the Royal Atlantic Hotel, where the woman was staying.

Several months after a new tenant for the Amagansett Farmers Market was expected to be named, the Peconic Land Trust and the Amagansett Food Institute, a nonprofit organization of farmers and food producers, announced on Monday that the latter has signed a lease to operate the market. The institute plans an Aug. 1 opening of the longtime landmark on the hamlet's Main Street.

The market, which will be open daily through the summer, will offer produce and other products made almost exclusively by East End and New York State farmers, fishers, vintners, and other food producers. The institute's members include Amber Waves Farm, Bhumi Farms, Carissa's Breads, the Amagansett Sea Salt Company, Dock to Dish, Food Pantry Farm, Balsam Farms, the Milk Pail, and Quail Hill Farm. South Fork Kitchens, the Institute's commercial incubator kitchen at Stony Brook Southampton, will also contribute to the market's offerings.

A mission to educate the community and visitors is among the institute's goals for the market, with programming, events, and educational materials integrated throughout the 3,000-square-foot space. The programming, according to a statement issued on Monday, will be aimed at reintroducing seasonality and a more traditional relationship with food as well as issues including health and nutrition, food waste, food insecurity, and sustainability.

"It's going to be quite different from what has been there before in that the vast bulk is going to be local," Kathleen Masters, the institute's executive director, said on Monday. "We're really excited about being able to have an outlet for goods produced in our incubator kitchen, and we're already hearing from a lot of other East End producers about the wonderful products being made here and who are interested in getting their products to the market. We're very excited about that."

Eli Zabar's lease on the space expired in November, and the land trust put out a request for proposals seeking another tenant for a three-year term, with a three-year renewal option. While it was known that the company would not be returning, and that the institute had been selected as the new lessee, discussions with the town as to what activities would be permitted on the site, such as cooking, caused a long delay in the announcement. Those discussions are ongoing, Ms. Masters said.

The Amagansett Farmers Market was opened in 1954 by Ellen Struk, known as Pat. In 2008, the trust, a nonprofit organization that works to preserve working farms and natural land, announced an agreement under which it would lease the property from Margaret de Cuevas, who had purchased it from Ms. Struk for $5.5 million. At that time, the Town of East Hampton purchased development rights on 7.56 acres of the 9.33-acre property. Amber Waves Farm, a not-for-profit educational farm with a community supported component serving 150 members, as well as farmers markets and restaurants, occupies that land.

Mr. Zabar had been the lessee since the trust's 2008 agreement with Ms. de Cuevas, his first lease expiring in November 2011. After the second lease expired, the trust issued a request for proposals, with the institute selected from among five applicants.

Throughout the winter and spring, the structure was in some disrepair. A new awning was recently installed after the previous one collapsed under the winter's heavy snowfall. Railings on the back deck were replaced, and parts of the roof and driveway were repaired. "For the purposes of running a farm stand," Ms. Masters said, "it's in reasonable shape."

Two men were injured, one critically, when they were struck by taxi in downtown Montauk early Sunday morning.

Benjamin Pileski, 20, of Mattituck, was taken to Southampton Hospital after the accident, which was reported at 3:09 a.m., and later transferred to Stony Brook University Hospital. He was listed in critical condition on Monday afternoon, according to a hospital spokeswoman.

Another Mattituck man, Justin Tyler, 20, was also taken to Southampton Hospital, and then transferred to Stony Brook, police said. He was suffering from several injuries, though apparently not as severe as Mr. Pileski's, and was listed in fair condition on Monday afternoon. Word quickly spread through the North Fork community that the two friends had been injured, according to Southold LOCAL.

According to East Hampton Town police Captain Chris Anderson, the two men were crossing Montauk Highway from the south near Carl Fisher Plaza, when they were struck by the westbound taxi, which, Capt. Anderson said, did not have a passenger aboard at the time.

The taxi driver, Irfan Mohammad, 43, of Shirley was not injured and was not charged in the incident.

The 2001 Honda van Mr. Mohammad was driving is registered to JEB Tech of Bohemia, a company that leases vehicles to drivers on a weekly basis. The company rents an office in East Hampton Town, which allows it to operate cars for hire.

The Springs School Board will hold a hearing on Monday on a plan to tap into a repair reserve fund to complete a handful of projects this summer.

The hearing will be at the school following the district's annual organizational meeting, which will begin at 5 p.m.

Liz Mendelman, who served as president of the Springs School Board this past school year, said Monday that the district has about $766,000 in that repair reserve fund, and that the district is not looking to spend all of it this summer.

The district's buildings and grounds committee, which is different from the recently created facilities committee, gathered estimates from contractors for a number of small repairs, Ms. Mendelman said. The specific items that need to be fixed will be detailed on Monday.

"They will be making recommendations on projects that are of a repair nature for the school board to look at, and then the board will decide whether to spend that money or not," she said. "They're all relatively little projects."

If the school board approves the projects, the district will most likely be able to complete them by the time school begins again in September. Ms. Mendelman called it "a tight timeline."

Unlike with the district's capital reserve fund, the school board does not need voter approval to spend money from the repair reserve fund. It was established by the school board during the 2009-10 school year. Since then, Ms. Mendelman said, Springs has been putting aside end-of-year surpluses, "essentially giving us a savings account" for repairs.

Springs has $2 million in its separate capital reserve fund. In May, voters in Springs rejected a proposal to spend all or most of that on a new parking lot, a reconfigured drop-off and pickup loop, and other physical changes to the campus.

A box truck crashed into a utility pole on Montauk Highway in Wainscott, bringing down wires across the road just west of the new Home Goods store on Tuesday afternoon. The highway was closed between Wainscott-Northwest Road and Sayre's Path while utility workers cleaned up the downed wires and replaced the pole. 

The accident was reported in front of SRK Pools at 370 Montauk Highway at 4:23 p.m. Only the truck was involved. Details of the crash were not immediately available. The pole cracked in half, coming to rest on top of the box truck. Wires from across the street were hanging low over the road, which is why police closed the road to traffic. 

The driver was not hurt. 

The Bridgehampton Fire Department responded, along with East Hampton Town police. Officers diverted traffic off the highway. PSEG-Long Island responded within a half-hour of the accident to start repairs. It was not clear how long the road would be closed.

Workers in the area said it was the fifth time a pole at that location had been hit in recent years, including one accident last year after which the pole was replaced. 

East Hampton Airport will shut down tonight at 8 to helicopters and other aircraft that create enough racket to be included in a “noisy aircraft” category, and to all air traffic at 11 p.m., as a contested overnight curfew goes into effect.

Takeoffs and landings of noisy aircraft can resume at 9 a.m. each morning, and at 7 a.m. for others. The East Hampton Town Board approved the year-round restriction in April, but it was put on hold after opponents sued to prevent it, pending a judge’s decision.

Judge Joanna Seybert of Federal District Court in Central Islip agreed on Friday that the town could institute the nighttime curfew, but red-lighted a tougher restriction that would have limited summertime takeoffs and landings by noisy aircraft to a single back-and-forth per week.

Planes that will be subject to the extended curfew are those that have been designated as having a measured “effective perceived noise in decibels” (EPNdb) approach level of 91 or greater, according to a measure used by the Federal Aviation Administration, based on an “annoyance level.” The category includes various types of helicopters, which have engendered a large number of noise complaints from residents across the East End.

 East Hampton Town has published a list of noisy-aircraft types and a guide for aircraft owners, “How Do I Tell If an Aircraft is Noisy,” at a website dedicated to airport matters, at htoplanning.com. (HTO is the airport’s official code.)

The new town laws were challenged by a coalition including several air carriers, as well as a group calling itself the Friends of the East Hampton Airport, a nonprofit corporation which, according to court documents, “represents the interests of those who seek to keep the airport open to all types, kinds, and classes of aircraft activities and flying services.”

The plaintiffs include the Associated Aircraft Group and HeliFlite Shares, which provide helicopter charter services and offer fractional aircraft ownership programs; Eleventh Street Aviation, and the Analar Corporation. Also, the Helicopter Association International, a Delaware trade association, and Sound Aircraft Services, which leases property at East Hampton Airport from the town and provides fuel and other services to aircraft operators and passengers.

In issuing the injunction against theonce-a-week limit on noisy aircraft, Judge Seybert agreed that “at least some” of the plaintiffs’ businesses would suffer “irreparable harm” should the law take effect, and called it “drastic, considering the effect it poses on some of plaintiffs’ businesses . . . There is no indication that a less restrictive measure would not also satisfactorily alleviate the airport’s noise problem,” she wrote.

“The majority of the aircrafts that many of the plaintiffs use for their charter services to the airport are subject to the town laws’ noisy aircraft definition,” Judge Seybert noted.

According to the president of the Analar Corporation, flights to and from East Hampton Airport account for 55 percent of the company’s revenue, and 65 percent of its flights would be prohibited under the town’s restriction. And the president of the Associated Aircraft Group reported, as the judge wrote, that “its prospective fractional owners have delayed purchasing shares and some of its existing fractional owners have delayed renewing their shares pending the outcome of this matter.”

“Additionally, Judge Seybert wrote, “some plaintiffs believe that they will have to reduce their fleets and terminate many of their employees, including highly skilled pilots.”

The town laws “undoubtedly will impose on some of the plaintiffs substantial business losses, major operational disruptions, and losses of good will that could be difficult to quantify,” she wrote. However, Judge Seybert wrote, “the ultimate question of whether the town may impose access restrictions to the airport could still be resolved on the merits in the town’s favor.”

She affirmed the right of East Hampton Town to adopt restrictions to address excessive airport noise, noting that “it cannot be argued that the town lacked the data to support a finding of a noise problem at the airport.”

The plaintiffs argued that the town justified its restrictions using “deeply flawed data” that did not comply with federal requirements, and that the “noisy aircraft” standard was “arbitrary and discriminatory.”

But, said the judge, in adopting the laws “the town considered formal complaints submitted through the airport’s formal complaint log, which yielded over 23,000 complaints. The court recognizes that a large portion of these complaints came from a small number of households, but it cannot be argued that the town lacked data to support a finding of a noise problem at the airport, particularly given the large increase in helicopter traffic in recent years.”

According to the town, helicopter traffic was up 50 percent last year over the year before.

Judge Seybert called the aviation groups’ assertion that the overnight curfew was unsafe, as it could cause pilots to make ill-advised decisions or divert them to airports unable to handle the increased traffic “purely speculative.”

“We’re pleased the judge has acknowledged that the town was justified in adopting restrictions to provide relief to the growing number of people who are negatively affected by aircraft noise,” East Hampton Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell said in a release.

“Although we regret that one of the key laws cannot be enforced for the time being, we are gratified that the court recognized that the law allows the kind of restrictions that are essential to protect the residents of this town.” After Judge Seybert heard oral arguments on May 18, the town agreed to postpone enforcement of the airport laws pending her decision on the requested injunction.

The Federal Aviation Administration supported the injunction request, saying that it needed time to examine the legality and impact of the laws.

In her 45-page decision, the judge reviewed various applicable federal laws and constitutional principles raised by the plaintiffs, among them a number of F.A.A. regulations.

The plaintiffs argued that the town laws were invalid, as they are pre-empted by federal aviation law, and that they violated the commerce clause of the Constitution by restraining interstate commerce. They claimed the restrictions also raised questions about compliance with the federal Airport Noise and Capacity Act of 1990 and the Airport and Airway Improvement Act of 1982.

The town has said that neither federal statute preempts its authority, as the airport proprietor, to adopt and enforce use restrictions.

Regardless, Judge Seybert ruled, those questions are a matter between federal authorities and the town, and not subject to a lawsuit by outside interests.

The court reserved judgment on another of the plaintiffs’ requests, that their suit against the town and one filed a little earlier against the F.A.A. be consolidated. In the latter lawsuit, the plaintiffs claim that the F.A.A. must continue to enforce a contractual agreement with the town regarding airport operations, despite agreeing, following the 2005 settlement of a private lawsuit, to suspend its enforcement at the end of 2014.

It requires an “airport sponsor to ‘make the airport available as an airport for public use on reasonable terms,’ ” according to the court files.

The suspension of that agreement, or “grant assurance” (an obligation to the F.A.A. regarding airport operations, put into effect when federal airport grants are accepted), set the groundwork for the town to enact its new restrictions, claiming more local control of the airport. A memo from the F.A.A. to former Representative Tim Bishop, addressing adherence to federal airport laws and how much local control the town might claim, is also at issue.

Judge Seybert said she was “sorely tempted to issue a ruling” that the F.A.A. was legally obligated to enforce the grant assurance, despite agreeing not to in 2005. She said, however, that she would not make any ruling before the F.A.A. submits a response in the present lawsuit. It is due on Wednesday.

“We are gratified that the court enjoined the one-trip limit, finding it to be drastic and unreasonable. We are carefully reviewing the decision and appellate options regarding the curfews,” Loren Riegelhaupt, a spokesman for Friends of the East Hampton Airport, said in an email last week.

“The court’s decision today is an important first step, but we must recognize that our opponents are well funded and will not give up easily,” said Councilwoman Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, the town’s airport liaison, in the town’s release. “In light of today’s ruling, however, we encourage our opponents to rethink their strategy. It’s time to do what’s best for the town and adapt aircraft operations to fit our reasonable restrictions.”

Violations of the new airport laws are deemed criminal offenses, with a sliding scale of fines for the first three violations, from $1,000 to $4,000, and then $10,000, and prohibition from the airport for a period of up to two years for a fourth. The town may also seek court injunctions, restraining orders, and monetary fines against any person or entity with an ownership interest in a violating aircraft.

The East Hampton-based Quiet Skies Coalition, a citizens group that has advocated for use restrictions at the airport to ameliorate aircraft noise, said on Twitter, “With today’s disappointing ruling by the judge, she has permitted businesses to prevail while East Enders suffer.”

East Hampton Town is represented in the lawsuit by Peter Kirsch, an attorney with Kaplan Kirsch & Rockwell of Denver, who has served as the town’s aviation law specialist, and by Eric Bregman, a former town attorney now affiliated with Farrell Fritz in Water Mill.