Friends, I wish to supplement the upcoming/current/past discussion to privatize air traffic control with some information that I'd like you to keep in mind going forward. To qualify, I am not against privatization for the sake of privatization. However, the entities pushing for such a move have an agenda, and it is fueled by spreading a false sense that the current ATC system is tragically lacking in the technology department, that this lack of updated technology is affecting efficiency, and that the government is the sole reason why we can't have this amazing technology that will save the day. I will quickly summarize a few key points that I don't have time to elaborate on here:
1 - There is no technology that will allow planes to land closer together. If you want to land more planes, build more runways. The only argument to counter this is to allow more than one plane on the runway at the same time. It takes about a mile to stop a plane. No thanks.
2 - Planes don't fly through thunderstorms. Even if it's sunny where you are now, and it's sunny where you going, if there is a line of storms somewhere in between, you're going to be delayed. Flights get compressed into the few places where it is safe to fly, and the system is designed to let this happen safely. Imagine a 5 lane expressway that has construction, and now only two lanes are open. Now imagine a situation where you CAN'T stop in traffic (planes don't like stopping in midair). You'd have to wait your turn.
3 - Finally, the main point I'd like to make: There is an implication that our current radar based system doesn't allow planes to fly the most efficient route possible. That we need a "space based" system. Planes already use GPS. All off them. Granted, when planes are flying around in the area between Chicago, Boston and DC and down the coast to FL, there are a TON of planes and not all of them can just fly wherever they want. The routes are structured so that planes aren't head to head when they are climbing and descending. Since there are so many airports on the east coast, the routes allow each airport to have it's place where the planes can climb and descend safely. For planes travelling west of the Mississippi, they are allowed to fly any route they'd like in most cases. They are allowed to fly direct from one airport to another with no land based navigational aids. We don't need an updated system to allow this to happen. It happens all day, every day. But, here's the thing, for transcontinental flights, even though they are allowed to fly any route they'd like, they RARELY fly direct. Here is an example of the same flight on two different days. JBU487 from Boston to LA.
May 1st
http://flightaware.com/…/J…/history/20170501/2158Z/KBOS/KLAX
This flight flew 2356 miles, and it took 6 hours and 13 minutes.
The next day
http://flightaware.com/…/J…/history/20170502/2158Z/KBOS/KLAX
This time they flew 2460 miles and it took 5 hours and 49 minutes.
This happens a lot. And it's because of wind. Planes fly these longer routes specifically because the less TIME they spend in the air, the less time the engines are turning and burning fuel. If a controller offered the May 2nd flight a shortcut to the left early in the flight, the pilots would refuse it because they would have hit a huge headwind and not had enough fuel to make it to LA.
So, an efficient system isn't about letting every plane fly direct. It's about letting planes fly different routes on different days to take advantage of good wind and to avoid thunderstorms. The current system does that whenever safely possible.
I'm sure there are plenty of good reasons to privatize an air traffic system, but the current state of our technology isn't one of them. Please remember this next time it comes up. Thanks for making it to the end!
