LEXIS-NEXIS® Academic Universe-Document

LEXIS-NEXIS® Academic

October 11, 1999, Monday Final

SECTION: Business Pg. 2

LENGTH: 779 words

HEADLINE: Airlines, FAA point fingers over flight delays

BYLINE: TOM BELDEN

SOURCE: Philadelphia Inquirer

BODY:
If you have taken an airline flight in 1999, particularly this summer, chances are good that your trip was delayed.

This has been the worst year for late flights since the major airlines started reporting on-time performance publicly in 1987. This summer, about 70% of flights were delayed by more than 15 minutes, the result primarily of stormy weather and a relentless increase in the number of airplanes in the skies.

The problem has the attention of the airline industry and the Federal Aviation Administration, as evidenced by a briefing for journalists in New York, sponsored by the Aviation Safety Alliance, an industry group. Just who is responsible for the dismal on-time record, and how to improve on it, were the subjects of debate among the carriers, the FAA and other observers.

Most people agree that it will take more air traffic controllers, continuing investment in more modern equipment and perhaps a radical change in the way the FAA is funded and managed to markedly improve the situation.

From the airlines' point of view, delivered by Robert L. Crandall, retired chairman of American Airlines, most of the blame should be placed on the FAA for its inability to modernize the air traffic control system.

Crandall ticked off 11 improvements in air traffic control technology or management of the system that the airlines consider necessary to solve the problem.

Congress came in for ample criticism, too, for what the industry considers inadequate funding for the FAA and for hamstringing the agency with federal purchasing rules. This results in it taking five to seven years to buy new radar and computer systems.

"No one disputes the importance of safety first," Crandall said. "On the other hand, it is hard to find any evidence that either the political or administrative branches of government have paid any serious attention to the goal of moving traffic efficiently."

Crandall also repeated a complaint that airlines have made for years. Lawmakers have "systematically raided" the Aviation Trust Fund, the federal pot where airline-ticket taxes go, using some of the $10 billion it collects annually on federal deficit-reduction instead of airport and other aviation needs, he said. Legislation to prevent that has passed the House and is pending in the Senate, he added.

One way to make the FAA more efficient would be for the United States to follow the lead of 16 of the world's biggest nations and create a traffic-control agency that is run more like a private business, Crandall said.

In defense of the FAA, Monte Belger, associate administrator for air-traffic services, said that most of Crandall's list of 11 specific improvements in technology or management tactics were under way or completed.

"Mr. Crandall made it sound like these things are controversial, and they're not," he said. "At least seven of the 11 that FAA controls are well under way."

Another of Crandall's suggestions -- to build more non-intersecting runways at major airports -- is under the control of local airport authorities, not federal officials, Belger noted.

On the privatization issue, Belger pointed out that the Clinton administration proposed taking a less radical but still major step four years ago: Make the agency an independent government corporation, with its own funding and rules for hiring and purchasing. But Congress turned down the proposal, and only in the last few months has lawmakers' interest been revived, he said.

Another idea for reducing delays is one the major hub airlines aren't keen on but might sound eminently sensible to passengers. The carriers could try jamming fewer flights into the system, especially in the late afternoon and early evening, when delays are at their worst.

To that, airline executives say they must schedule flights to match what their competitors are doing, and that frequent flights are what their best business-travel customers want.

But Bill Cotton, United Airlines' manager of air traffic and flight systems, said at the briefing that his company may seek federal permission to discuss coordination of schedules with other airlines as a way to reduce delays at Chicago's O'Hare Airport. Such a meeting would be illegal without a special exemption from antitrust laws.

In the meantime, the only short-term solution to the flight-delay problem could be a scenario few people would welcome: a big downturn in the U.S. economy that causes airline traffic to drop sharply. That would almost certainly prompt carriers to cut back on flights at their hub airports, especially at the peak travel times when most business travelers want to fly.

LOAD-DATE: October 12, 1999