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Government/Legislation
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FAA redesigns airspace to reduce delays and more
In continuing efforts to reduce delays, fuel consumption, aircraft emissions, and noise, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has issued a final redesign for the New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia metropolitan area airspace.
The FAA held more than 120 public meetings to create the airspace redesign alternative involving a 31,000-square-mile area with a population of 29 million residents. Twenty-one airports were included in the study. The FAA says this alternative will reduce delays, complexity of the current air traffic system, fuel consumption and carbon emissions, and aircraft noise. It estimates benefits of reduced delays to reach 20 percent by 2011 compared with no changes. This alternative will also allow the FAA to move more quickly to satellite-based technology. Additional project information is available at: www.faa.gov/nynjphl_airspace_redesign.
“This new concept in airspace design will help us handle the rapidly growing number of flights in the Northeast in a much more efficient way,” said FAA Administrator Marion C. Blakey. “This airspace was first designed in the 1960s and has become much more complex. We now need to look at creative new ways to avoid delays.”
Blakey has also recently told airlines they need to address their scheduling practices, which are at times “out of line with reality.” According to government data, the industry's on-time performance—72 percent of flights arriving on time—in the first seven months of 2007, was its worst since comparable data began being collected in 1995.
Sources: Federal Aviation Administration, The Arizona Republic
