Re: Senators still demand user fees

Andrew Gideon wrote:
Can you cite where in there you found this type of math; I've missed it.

In the last of the four links provided by Matt Barrow in his post, reposted here for clarity:

http://www.reason.org/ps347_business_jets_atc.pdf

Table 5, Page 27.

To put the same math another way, the kind of savings required to break even under the proposed costs is 1.33 hours per month. If a corporate jet flew once every two weeks, it would have to save a combined 40 minutes a _flight_ in time under ATC just to remain at current cost levels.

I'm esp. curious whether the delays in question really are the result of
ATC throughput or if they're runway throughput.

The proposals thus far presented try to make the case that it is the former, caused in large part by the wide margins necessary in a human-controlled and administrated system. Earlier however, the inference is made that the proposed system will prevent a hypothetical "rationing" situation wherein flights will be given priority based on need, indicating a problem with the latter.

In short, they have no idea where the problem actually exists, but look over there! Shiny new technology!

They can't plan for that. It would show the folly/dishonesty of charging
GA the "cost of services provided".

One of the other arguments they use is the disparity between corporate jet taxes and fractional ownership or charter taxi taxes. What they fail to consider is that, especially under fractional ownership, the costs are defrayed amongst several individuals, whereas corporate jet operation is undertaken entirely by one. They only consider the per-plane taxation as relevant, when it patently is not.

It is this kind of statistical manipulation with which they have convinced some that implementing heavy taxation on a small segment of the flying community while relaxing that on the largest segment is the best solution for all the ails of modern aviation. That's just not true.

It would be useful, though, to show what it would take to reduce ATC
service costs. For example, how low would traffic have to drop before
(for example) NY TRACON would be able to reduce staff by merging sectors?

Not very far, if their delay schema can be applied in reverse.

The problems that they are arguing against here are issues with the hub-and-spoke system that the airlines implement to assuage their logistics chains. It's a symptom of too many people concentrating their usage on too few locations at the same time, not a problem of overall inability of the system to compensate for global demand. They use examples like peak time at O'Hare, without stopping to consider the other 23 hours of the day, or alluding to flight distribution throughout the day.

Their solution, then, is to use (very expensive) technology to cram more flights in less space, so that the underlying problem of too many flights trying to use the same airport at the same time can roll on, and sneaking in a rather sizable bit of pork for their airline buddies to boot.

A real long-term solution is to:

A: Solicit Congress to get off their ass and fund the FAA properly.
B: Use those funds to build more airports or expand existing ones.
C: Provide financial incentives for the airlines to shift flights to off-peak hours (distribute the load).
D: Update and maintain the underlying technology and facilities.
E: Provide tax incentives for using more "desirable" forms of aviation, NOT by taxing operation, and NOT by taxing services, and NOT by privatizing the whole system, but through point-of-sale and registration. That way, the only ones discouraged are the intended targets, not the whole community.

TheSmokingGnu
.

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