Don't Hold Your Breath Waiting For The FAA To Solve Nation's Air Transport Woes
from the the-sky-is-still-falling dept
The expanded use of private and smaller regional jets has been hard on the nation's air travel system, because these planes use up infrastructure at a level that's disproportionate to the number of passengers they carry. Of course, the problems we've seen all summer only heighten the appeal of private air travel, further exacerbating the problem. Making matters worse is the fact that the FAA has shown no inclination to find innovative solutions. As Lynne Kiesling points out, there are a number of creative solutions out there that could mitigate the problem, none of which are really being pursued. Airlines could be forced to bid on landing rights, for example, which would force companies to prioritize their routes in a positive manner. As it is, landing fees are based on weight, which doesn't account for the longer time small planes spend on the runways. It's also been argued that the GPS system could do a better job of monitoring traffic than the existing radar systems, but plans to go down this route have stalled due to politics. Ultimately, there's no reason to expect the FAA to be innovative. It doesn't face any market pressure and there's no risk of it going under if it doesn't adapt. Instead, the only solution pushed is to encourage airlines to stop using small planes, which isn't very creative at all. All that would do is reduce options for customers, particularly those on less-traveled routes.
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Blame Government, Not Airlines
That's only an issue if our "infrastructure" is fixed. And it's only fixed because the government has decreed it fixed.
Stated differently: We deregulated airlines, but not airports or air traffic control. How is that the airlines' fault?
Lay the blame where it belongs: On "not enough deregulation" rather than on "too much deregulation." Fault the government, not the entrepreneurs and cusotmers who are constrained by it.
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Where's the creative thinking?
What about collaboration between government, industry and user groups, for example? Oh no! That might limit the freedom of the airlines to do anything they want to, and damn the public interest.
I don't give the government a pass on this either. It's government's job to seek solutions - except it's bought and paid for by political contributions (bribes).
The departments are headed up by political hacks like Chertoff, and the like.
Let's face it - we're screwed - and will get screwed worse until we start throwing the professional office holders out after one term. And that doesn't require a term limits law.
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Re:
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Whose problem?
Unfortunately, the government hasn't had a very good track record on solving public problems for the past, oh, 200 years or more. So I'm not expecting a solution to this one, either, but in a more perfect world, they are the ones who should solve it (to the benefit of the traveling public), or at least take a lead in promoting a solution.
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A new hire in the FAA starts out at the Academy making just a little over $8/hr. Screw Marion Blakey and the FAA!!!
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Capacity
It's time for an alternative to air for the most congested corridors such as Boston to New York to Philadelphia to DC and Sacremento to SF to LAX to San Deigo.
Europe and Japan use high speed rail to a much larger extent for such short haul transit. It's time for the US to invest some transit dollars in high speed rail.
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Re: Capacity
High speed rail is a pretty expensive solution, given where we are at right now, and kind of inflexible and slow to respond to changes in demand if you don't already have suitable track in place for the new route. Perhaps it is a good solution, but perhaps there are better ones. I don't know what might be better, but I'd not like to focus on one solution too quickly, before there has been enough effort by enough creative people to be confident that we've identified most viable solutions. Of course, knowing when to stop studying and start solving is an art, and one relatively few people have mastered.
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Its not as crowded as you think.
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I travel every week
As for the FAA, many people have unreal expectations of our government. Politicians and bureaucrats are not good at fixing things. They are good at standing in front of a TV camera and complaining. There are no problem solvers in the US government. If anything, they (politicians) create more problems than they solve. Corruption, pork barrel projects, or just plain ineptitude dominate our government. Bureaucrats are not incented to actually do things that benefit the citizens they serve. They are paid to cover their own backsides, and preserve the status quo. You will not find any bureaucrat willing to shake up the system. It would end their cushy desk job in a hurry.
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Re:
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Time on runways.
I'd sure like to know what facts that statement is based on.
It seems counter-intuitive, at best, to me.
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Moron!
Moron! Most smaller planes land at runways that do not have a lot of traffic. Do yourself a favor and go to your local ‘big’ airport and count how many smaller planes you see. You will get a quick lesson in economics, why would a smaller, more efficient plane want to wait in a long line of big plane competing to take off, when they could land at a less busy airport a few miles away?
“there's no reason to expect the FAA to be innovative. It doesn't face any market pressure and there's no risk of it going under if it doesn't adapt.”
There is a great idea, lets deregulate the FAA. Moron! It did not work for the airlines, the electric companies (California)… Imagine, many smaller companies competing for a small government contract only to fail its users, oh wait, Lockheed Martin already did that when they placed their, lower wage employees as pre-flight weather briefers. Great Idea!
“As it is, landing fees are based on weight, which doesn't account for the longer time small planes spend on the runways”
Brain Surgeon Award of the week! Why would smaller planes spend longer amount of time on the runway? Small planes are lighter; therefore, less runway is required and they do not compete with the ‘big airplanes’ at the terminals. Smaller planes spend less time on the runway and do not create terminal backup like ‘big airplanes’ do.
“Airlines could be forced to bid on landing rights, for example, which would force companies to prioritize their routes in a positive manner.”
Genius, just kidding, still a moron! What makes you think airlines so do not prioritize their routes in a positive manner? Airlines just love spending money to fly people around the sky, just for fun.
Do some research please!
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Re: Time on runways.
Likewise if a piper cub (50 mph landing speed) gets into the approach pattern at a busy airport, a line of much faster jets (150 mph landing speed) behind get held up in a holding pattern waiting for the slower piper to land and clear the runway.
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Re:
Also, smaller airplanes DO NOT take up more time on the runway. They are lighter, so they take off at MUCH slower speeds than a jetliner will, and will use only a small portion of the runway.
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The Press Once Again Gets It Wrong...
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Re: Capacity
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Runways and Airline Schedules are the problem
The airlines KNOW most of those planes will be late, becuase you have 25 planes lined up to depart. The last one is significantly late. Then the passengers are late at their arrival, causing some to miss connections. Now those passengers have to be rebooked.
The next flight that late plane was supposed to take now departs late, repeat several hundred times a day.
The Hub and Spoke system causes significant congestion as well. I live under the approach to Denver International Airport. In the morning and in the afternoon there is a rush of airplanes coming in, then a rush of flights leaving. You get "rush hours" when connecting flights come in and leave. The rest of the time the runways are pretty dead.
During "rush hours" there are more planes than runways, and the last airplane is very late. Add a thunderstorm, snow, or high winds during "rush hour" and suddenly the schedule falls apart.
The FAILING AIRLINES have chosen this model, and it is failing. Rather than change the way they do business, they want the government to change the entire airspace system to correct a non-existent problem.
Businesses are starting to fly in business jets, because the cannot afford the poor performance of the airlines. Now the airlines are trying to increase the cost of private air travel to kill off that competition, by claiming that private aviation is causing congestion. Funny, the several thousand non-airline airports in this country never seen to aircraft waiting in line to take off or land. I fly regularly and the whole point of private aviation is that I DON'T have to use the airline airports.
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Re: Re: Time on runways.
I will also use this post to discuss other topics brought up...
General Aviation aircraft, like my 5 passenger airplane, do not need air traffic control to fly the public airspace (notice that it IS the public airspace not Jet Blue airspace, or UAL airspace, I repeat, it is public property just like the roads and highways you drive... Are you ready to concede that UPS or Greyhound owns the national highways and you should have to have their permission to use it? Are you ready to be declared a "morning commuter" who is clogging up the highway and needs to be taxed and regulated because you are slowing down the big corporate trucks and costing them money? Because that is the analogous situation to claiming that the airlines have the rights to the national airspace simply because someone is paying them a profit for the trip...)
I flew yesterday from mid Michigan to South of Cleveland and back on family business... I did not file a flight plan (did you file a plan with the state police to drive to work?) with air traffic control... I did not need an air traffic controller to give me permission to land at the small airports I used (Did you need permission to pull into Starbucks?)
I do not need runways that are hundreds of feet wide and three feet thick with reinforced concrete that can hold up a million pounds of airplane. (my airplane weighs 3100 pounds)
I do not strip search my passengers as they are all known to me...
I also do not use JFK, ORD, LAX, etc. etc. etc... I would be in the way of the big jets and they are dangerous to me... So,if your trip on one of the airlines is slowed down by other airplanes, it is other jets, cargo haulers, Airforce One, etc., not general aviation like me...
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Re: Re:
My comment cited a piper as an extreme example but the same is true of commuter turboprops. At airports with multiple runways ATC sets aside a commuter runway but that's not possible at LaGuardia or Reagan.
Also if a plane is within 1 mile of the runway (approaching or departing), it's holding the runway for anyone else to use so it doesn't need to be setting on the runway to tie it up.
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Re Commuters
That's true, but again those are turboprops OWNED and RUN by the airlines. The problem is NOT general aviation, it is the fashion in which airlines operate and schedule.
The airlines schedule it so these small turboprop airliners are coming in the same time as the mad rush of jet airliners during "rush hour".
The delays in the system are entirely created *by the airlines* (even weather delays are worsened by the overscheduling of runways).
The airlines treat runways the same way they treat passenger seats, they overbook and then make the passengers deal with the consequences.
The core of this is that private aircraft have *NOTHING* to do with the delays and congestion at airline hubs. The airlines are trying to scapegoat private aircraft to avoind having to deal with their management issues.
To echo Denny's comments, I flew from Denver to DC and back in my private aircraft (a 42 year old Piper Cherokee with monthly payments of $350) and, except for when I got near DC's 'security zone' I did not talk to ANY air traffic control resources. I landed at small fields away from major airports.
As a side note, the airlines claim the air is saturated with airplanes. I flew over 4000 miles and except for landing air airports I never saw another airplane. The congestion occurs from airlines trying to cram more flights into the same 30 airports at the same times. The remainder of the 5000 airports in this country have no congestion problems.
The solution is not to try to surpress non-airline aviation, but to encourage it. Let light jets and point-to-point flights bring those other 5000 airports into play. Stop trying to cram more and more traffic into the same 30 airports.
Also, there are only 30 major terminal airports in this country. Three are around DC, Three are around NYC, Three are in Florida, Three are in California. Including NYC and DC, nine of the 30 busiest airports in the north east. Out west here, I can fly for DAYS and never come within 100 miles of a terminal airport. Mosts states in the country do NOT have a major terminal airport within their boundaries.
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Right on all points, guys. You cut through all the airline's BS.
How come we never hear that viewpoint in the newspapers?
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Re: Re Commuters
agree to a point. yes the turboprops are by the airlines, but my reason in making that point was to support (much as I hate to) the FAA's assertion that the carriers have to start using larger craft. (something that others here have dismissed as silly). Much of the congestion now is from the carriers going to more small turboprops and RJ's
However, when you state that "private aircraft have *NOTHING* to do with the delays and congestion at airline hubs" I have to disagree. When the GA uses teterboro, it impacts the approaches to newark and kennedy and laguardia.
I'm not sure where I stand on whether GA should be paying more towards ATC services or not, but I get the feeling that the congestion at some of the busiest hubs could be best resolved by going to some other mode. Nexgen ain't gonna cut it.
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Re: Re: Capacity
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Re: Re: Re Commuters
Another example of this is London, where Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted are all fairly close to each other, as well as city central, and a few RAF bases.
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