Carriers call for relief from delays

"The FAA's system is broken," said an Air Transport Association of America report made public by the House Transportation Committee. "If it is not fixed, the resulting delays will virtually eliminate the dependability of airline schedules and the system will descend into gridlock."

Jane Garvey, administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration, told the panel the government is doing the best it can to fix a complex and outdated system that was plagued by unusual weather problems this year.

"The FAA is willing to do whatever is within our power to improve the efficiency of the air traffic system, so long as safety is not compromised," Garvey said.

In its report, the trade group forecast that by 2008, the number of passengers will increase 43 percent and an additional 2,500 planes will be needed to transport those people. With the current system in place, the additional traffic would cause a 250 percent rise in delays, the group said.

From April through August this year, delays rose 36 percent, a figure federal officials largely blamed on weather. The delays intensified the fight among air traffic controllers, airlines and the federal government over who is responsible and how to fix the problem.

Last year, delays cost airlines and fliers $4.5 billion, the report estimates. More than 100,000 people were delayed each day, it said, with fliers in Dallas-Fort Worth, Chicago O'Hare and Detroit airports least likely to fly on time.

The report is the latest round of the blame game stemming from the boom in delays this year.

Air traffic controllers, for example, say airlines cause much of the problem by scheduling more flights into some airports than can land, causing a backup. The airline report disputes that, saying delays attributed to a large number of scheduled flights amounted to only 7.5 percent of all air traffic delays.

The FAA, meanwhile, says weather problems account for 75 percent of delays.

The House and Senate are in tough negotiations on two versions of a bill that would provide millions of dollars to build new runways and other airport facilities to handle large volumes of flights and passengers.

But the shortage of facilities is only part of the problem, Garvey said. Her agency is in the midst of a $13 billion modernization program to update air traffic monitoring systems and to find ways to deal with bad weather and a booming regional airport industry. She said the modernization will take about eight years, and the eastern portion of the country should see benefits within five years.

The improvements include upgrading FAA computers and displays in en route centers and airport traffic controlling facilities. The agency also is studying technology that would free pilots from the limits of the existing system of aerial highways and let pilots take routes they select, a concept called "free flight."

The air carrier report recommends that the FAA modernize the air traffic control system, react more flexibly to weather problems and install procedures and technologies that allow more planes to land and take off.

10-15-99