Category AVIATION &ТНЕ ROLE OF GOVERNMENT

This new legislation has also raised the prospect of federal government involvement in state and local law enforcement issues, which may violate long-standing federal law. The Posse Comita­tus Act of 1878 is an arcane statute passed by Congress toward the end of the Reconstruction Era after the Civil War. The Reconstruction Era refers to the period after the defeat of the Con­federate states during which the former rebellious states were reincorporated into the Union. Fed­eral troops had occupied the former Confederate States to enforce federal law and to police state and local elections.

Posse Comitatus is Latin for “power of the county” and the doctrine arose in England in the 15th century to support the common law right of local sheriffs to impress citizens into a posse to enforce the law. In the American colonies, the doctrine referred to the military enforcement of civil or state laws, which was anathema to the colonists due to the use of British military forces in the colonies to enforce laws passed by the Eng­lish Parliament prior to the American Revolution.

The Constitution of the United States spe­cifically limits the role of the military in civil matters, and makes the military at all times sub­ject to the oversight of civilian elected author­ity. The Constitution also limits the role of the federal government generally, reserving unto the states all powers not specifically granted by the Constitution to the federal government. During the Civil War some constitutional protections, like habeas corpus (which is a constitutional safeguard and mechanism to prevent unlaw­ful or secret imprisonment of citizens) were suspended by President Lincoln under claim of “war powers.” After the Civil War ended, the federal military occupied the South as a con­quered territory and became the primary tool of law enforcement.

The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 was designed to remove federal military author­ity over the state and local governments of the southern states after 13 years of Reconstruction. The original law specifically prohibits the Army from enforcing civilian law, and by amend­ment in 1956, it also includes the Air Force. By a directive of the Department of Defense, the Navy and the Marines are also prohibited from interfering with or participating in state and local law enforcement. The Coast Guard, which is now lodged in the Department of Homeland Security, is not covered by the Act or by any federal directive because the Coast Guard is actively involved in coastal law enforcement and has a federal complementary mission with the states.

The use of military or federal government drones within the United States, therefore, will be a subject of constitutional and judicial scru­tiny because of the Posse Comitatus Act as well as the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution.

The governmental entities created by the Treaty of Rome were entities in name only. They had been created and their responsibilities had been generally articulated. But boxes on an orga­nizational chart must be given life by those who will take up the duty of beginning to per­form the responsibilities assigned to them. The jurisdictional limits of each had to be estab­lished, and then tested one against the other. A pecking order had to be worked out. Bureau­cratic motivations, goals, and energies had to be demonstrated. Results were measured. In the course of starting up a program as ambitious and unique as the European Economic Commu­nity, monumental uncertainties were expected and experienced, but they gradually gave way to a semblance of purpose and order. We will next review these governing entities and their duties, and we will then see how they came together to perform their difficult joint function of pulling together the various disparate Mem­ber States into one cohesive, cooperative, and effective unit.

The Council, composed of representatives appointed from the Member States (one represen­tative from each Member State), has both execu­tive and legislative functions. It is charged with responsibility for ensuring that the objectives of the EC, as an entity, are realized and put into practice. It may issue regulations and directives that are binding on Member States. Regulations are normally adopted based on recommendations of the Commission or Parliament. Work of the Council was compromised, particularly early on, by representatives’ allegiances to their own gov­ernment’s interest, rather than to the collective interests of the EC. National governments still retain some powers not delegated to the EU.

Parliament is composed of elected repre­sentatives from the Member States (754 repre­sentatives elected by citizens of Member States). From the first elections held in 1979, the Parlia­ment has assumed a larger and more powerful role in the EU as a result of the 1992 Maastricht Treaty (amended in the Treaty of Lisbon, signed in 2007 and entered into force on December 1, 2009) and the 1997 Amsterdam Treaty. The European Parliament, through these treaties, has progressed from a consultative body to a true legislative assembly. The Parliament is the only EU body that meets and debates in public, and it enacts the majority of European laws today. The legislative procedure for enacting legisla­tion depends on a “co-decision” process through which the Parliament and the Council are put on an equal footing, and together they enact laws proposed by the Commission. Unlike similar legislative bodies, the Parliament does not pos­sess the right of legislative initiative or the pro­posing of law. The members of Parliament are committed to act on behalf of the EC rather than at the behest of their constituency or their home governments, and sit in political groups instead of national delegations. Examples of European political groups that represent a particular politi­cal allegiance are: (1) European Conservative and Reformists, (2) European People’s Party, and (3) Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe.

The Commission is headquartered in Brus­sels and is composed of 27 representatives appointed by the Member State governments (one commissioner per State). Due to the breadth of its administrative duties, it is the largest of the

EU institutions, employing about half of all EU employees. The Commission is unique in that it is responsible for proposing all legislation to the European Parliament (for co-decision with the Council). The Commissioners all swear an oath of independence, disclaiming any partisan influ­ence from any source, and undertake to protect the interests of the European citizen, not the national citizen.

The Commission is in the nature of a Secre­tariat, or executive body, having primarily execu­tive duties, and its purpose is to see to it that the development of the EC conforms to the require­ments of the Treaty of Rome. It has considerable autonomy in matters of competition, trade policy, and agriculture. It issues recommendations and opinions to the Council with the view to having the Council adopt binding regulations or directives to enforce compliance, specifically with regard to competition issues. The Commission has taken the lead in forcing compliance with the objectives of the Treaty of Rome (e. g., that the EC act as a cohesive force for the common good of the Mem­ber States rather than in their own national inter­ests). The Commission has gradually accrued more power and responsibility since the 1980s, primarily as a result of decisions of the Court of Justice.

The foregoing were the original political institutions of the EEC, and remain as such in the European Union.

The European Court of Justice, although not political, was an original institution of the Treaty of Rome. It sits in Luxembourg and is the highest court in the EC. It is responsible for inter­preting the treaties that established the EU and its predecessors and the laws, regulations, and direc­tives emanating from its institutions.

The progression of rocketry from literary fancy to scientific reality is generally credited to three men, all of whom worked separately from each other at about the same time. All were inspired by Jules Verne.

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky (1857-1935) was a provincial math teacher who spent most of his life in the small Russian town of Kaluga. Tsiolkovsky was a theoretician in aerodynamic flight, working through some of the same prob­lems the Wright brothers did at about the same time. His theories extended into jet propulsion and rocketry, as well as to the mechanics of liv­ing in space. In 1895 he published Dreams of the Earth and Sky, in which he described the mining of asteroids.

Tsiolkovsky’s primary work, Explora­tion of the Universe with Reaction Machines, was published in 1903 and is generally recog­nized as containing the first scientifically prov­able theories on the use of rockets in space. His writings are very detailed, including his specification for a mix of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen to fuel the engine of his theo­retical spacecraft. Hydrogen was first liquefied in 1898, and it is nothing short of amazing that this mixture propels the Space Shuttle today. Tsiolkovsky was a true theoretician, never attempting to prove his theories by practical applications, like building models or attempt­ing motor or flight tests. In spite of the volume of his publications, his work was not widely known outside of Russia.

Robert Goddard (1882-1945) was inspired not only by Jules Verne’s writings but also by another science fiction tome, H. G. Well’s The War of the Worlds. He dedicated himself to aero­nautics and space issues from an early age, and his first article, “The Use of the Gyroscope in the Balancing and Steering of Airplanes,” was published by Scientific American in 1907.2 After earning a Ph. D. in physics in 1911, he regis­tered two patents describing multistage launchers and liquid and solid propellant rockets, which became central to the progression of rocket sci­ence. By 1916, his work was being partially sub­sidized by the Smithsonian Institution.3

Goddard’s 1919 manuscript entitled A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes, pub­lished by the Smithsonian in 1920, is regarded as a seminal work in the pioneering of rocketry. He continued his experimentation with rockets, launching the first liquid-fueled rocket on March 16, 1926, in a cabbage patch near Auburn, Mas­sachusetts. Although it rose only 184 feet in 2.5 seconds, it proved the workability of liquid-fuel propellants in rockets.

Like many who had gone before, much of Goddard’s work was met by mocking and scorn, particularly by the press, and most particularly by The New York Times.4 Although he withdrew from public view and conducted his experiments in as much privacy as possible, Goddard still attracted notoriety with each rocket launch. Launch failures and ensuing ground fires caused the Massachu­setts State Fire Marshal to prohibit Goddard from conducting any further tests in the state.

Charles Lindbergh found Goddard’s work fascinating and full of promise, and contacted him in November 1929. Lindbergh was famous by this time, and the lending of his name and credibility to Goddard’s experimentation was invaluable. Through the influence of Lindbergh, Daniel Gug­genheim agreed to fund Goddard’s research in the amount of $50,000 beginning in 1930. Goddard continued to receive support from the Guggen­heim Foundation in the ensuing years.5

Seeking open space and relative solitude, in July 1930, Goddard relocated to, of all places, Roswell, New Mexico,6 where he continued his research and experimentation until the beginning of

World War II. He experimented with rocket control through movable vanes and rudders, as well as the use of gyroscopes. His rockets carried aloft the first payload, a barometer and a camera. Details of all of his work were published in 1936 in the treatise, Liquid Propellant Rocket Development.

Efforts to interest the United States govern­ment in his work were unsuccessful. But not everyone was unable to grasp the potential of his work. The new government of Germany, which took power in January 1933, was highly inter­ested in Goddard’s work. The National Socialist German Workers Party, also known by its acro­nym, the “Nazi Party,” led by Adolf Hitler, was very interested indeed.

Hermann Oberth (1894-1989) was born in Romania but lived his life in Germany. He was one of the first to discover the works of Konstan­tin Tsiolkovsky, during the 1920s. He published the book, The Rocket into Interplanetary Space, in 1923. This book presented theories very simi­lar to Goddard’s, but Oberth denied that he had had the benefit of Goddard’s work beforehand.7 Oberth conducted his own experiments during the 1920s, and in 1929 published an updated ver­sion of his previous book under the title of The Road to Space Travel.

Largely due to Oberth’s efforts, rocketry became popular in Europe during the 1920s. In 1928, Wernher von Braun, while attending a boarding school in northern Germany, happened on Hermann Oberth’s book (The Rocket into Interplanetary Space). Fascinated, he launched himself into a program of physics and math­ematics that would prepare him for the fledgling science of rocketry. By 1930, von Braun was a student at the Technical University of Berlin, where Oberth was an instructor. An amateur rocketry group inspired by Oberth’s book, known as the “Spaceflight Society,” held meetings on the Berlin campus, and von Braun became a member. It was here that he met Oberth, and as a result von Braun was selected to assist Oberth in his liquid-fueled rocket motor tests. At this time von Braun was introduced to Goddard’s work, and he followed up with his own research into Goddard’s publications through scientific jour­nals and publications.

The German Army began its rocket pro­gram in 1931. When it came to power in 1933, the Nazi government placed the advancement of rocketry high on its military “want list.” At the time, the terms of the Versailles Treaty (the 1918 agreement that ended World War I) prohibited Germany from developing military aircraft, but it said nothing about rocketry, mainly because practical rocketry was unknown to anyone except to a handful of engineers. The German Army began recruiting bright university students with credentials and interest in rocket science.

By 1933, von Braun was working on his doctoral dissertation in physics. Because of a research grant from the German Army, von Braun began collaborating on a secret solid-fuel

program at the ballistic weapons center at Kummersdorf. The Kummersdorf site was moved to Peenemunde on the Baltic coast in 1936. Peenemunde was the secret laboratory and test site for the development of the V-2 rocket, which is recognized as the immediate precursor of the launch vehicles later used in the U. S. space program. The V-2 was the first practical rocket, 46 feet in length and weighing 27,000 pounds. It flew at speeds in excess of 3,500 miles an hour and delivered a 2,200-pound warhead 500 miles away. It was put to use against Allied targets, including London, in September 1944.

With the approach of Allied forces toward the end of World War II, von Braun arranged the defection of about 125 of his top rocket sci­entists and engineers, who brought with them their plans, drawings, and test results. Von Braun and his “rocket team” became the backbone of the United States’ ballistic missile program after World War II, and ultimately were largely responsible for the development of the Saturn V super launch vehicle that propelled the Apollo modules to the moon. Although von Braun was central to the perfection of rocket science in its practical aspects, he is considered in the “second generation” of rocket pioneers.

Aside from telecommunications, private enter­prise remained largely on the sidelines of space operations. The “government only” perception began to change during the 1980s. Europe’s Arianespace began offering launch services in 1983. This was followed by President Reagan’s Executive Order 12465 signed in 1984, which authorized U. S. commercial space launch activity with the words “in order to encourage, facilitate, and coordinate the development of commercial expendable launch vehicle (ELV) operations by private United States enterprises.” Up to that time, all U. S. commercial satellites had been launched on rockets owned and operated by the United States government. The Executive Order was followed by passage in Congress of the Commercial Space Launch Act that same year, which directed the Department of Transportation to “encourage, facilitate, and promote commer­cial space launches.” The DOT set up the Office of Commercial Space Transportation to address the transition from government to commercial operations. In 1989, the U. S. government decided to stop launching commercial payloads on the Space Shuttle, in part because of the Challenger disaster that occurred in 1986. This spurred com­mercial launch interest even more.

The Commercial Space Launch Act estab­lished a comprehensive licensing structure that enabled launch operators to comply quickly and efficiently with existing federal regulations. The statute also authorized the licensing of nonfed­eral launch sites, from which commercial space launches would occur, in addition to commercial launches from federal sites. In 1995, the licensing responsibility was transferred from the DOT to the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transpor­tation (FAA/AST), which now licenses and regu­lates U. S. commercial space launch and reentry activity, including launch vehicles. It also licenses nonfederal launch sites. But even with the man­date given to FAA/AST, there were at least 12 other federal bureaus identified that could have some jurisdiction in regulating space activities. In fact, it was not clear under existing law that a pri­vate company could legally land a launched vehi­cle back in the United States. There was clearly a need for clarification of the limits of commercial space law and its regulation by FAA/AST.

Jl Wright brothers’ airplane (a model B, modi­fied for the flight) would be the first air­plane to fly coast-to-coast in the United States in 1911, piloted by a nearly deaf, cigar smok­ing 32 year old motorcycle racer and yachtsman of independent means. This was Cal Rodgers, great-grandnephew of Captain Oliver Hazard Perry (who defeated a British squadron at the Battle of Lake Erie in the War of 1812), and the great-grandson of Commodore Matthew Cal­braith Perry (who was in command of the U. S. Navy contingent that sailed into Tokyo Bay in 1853), the latter being credited with the opening of feudalistic and xenophobic Japan to U. S. and international trade for the first time. Cal Rodg­ers wanted to follow in his esteemed forefathers’ footsteps, but he was denied admission to the United States Naval Academy due to the hear­ing deficiency that had resulted from an onset of scarlet fever when he was six years old.

It could be said that Cal Rodgers had been at loose ends for most of his adult life. At six feet four inches tall, he had excelled at football in college, but thereafter he seemed to be unable to find his niche. He was never required to work for a salary due to his financial station, and he spent his days after college in “gentlemen’s” pursuits and in amateur sports adventures. Cal’s cousin, Lt. John Rodgers, was in 1911 a recent graduate of the Naval Academy, and he had been assigned
to take flying lessons at the Wright brothers’ fly­ing school in Dayton, Ohio (Huffman Prairie) as a part of the fledgling Naval Aviation program. It was there during the first half of 1911, while vis­iting with his cousin, that Cal Rodgers encoun­tered his first airplane up close.

Cal received ninety minutes of flight instruc­tion from Orville Wright and considered that he was ready for solo flight. Orville disagreed, so Cal just bought one of the Wright’s Model Bs and took off on his own. He entered his first aer­ial competition in July 1911, and in August, he won $ 11,000 at the International Aviation Meet in Chicago for endurance aloft.

Not quite one year earlier, in October 1910, publisher William Randolph Hearst had offered a prize of $50,000 for any person who could fly coast-to-coast within a period of thirty days from start to finish. In spite of no serious threat to the prize money from anyone else, Rodgers decided that he could win that endurance prize as well. Orville Wright, again, disagreed with the brash Rodgers, believing that the state of the aviation art had not progressed to the point where any fly­ing machine could endure such a trial. Undaunted, Rodgers lined up financial support from the Chi­cago meat packer J. Ogden Armour, who had just inaugurated a new five cent soft drink called the “Vin Fiz.” Armour seized on the idea of a cross­country publicity campaign as being just the right
promotion for his new drink and agreed to finance the venture. (See Figure App 6-1.)

The modified Model В was dubbed the “Vin Fiz” and carried the designation “EX,” which denoted that it was for exhibition fly­ing. The primary distinguishing characteristic of the Model В was the absence of the forward elevator, or canard, which had been the primary vertical control device on all prior Wright mod­els, including the “A.” The Model В was larger than the EX, with a wingspan of 38.5 feet to only 32 feet for the exhibition model. Both craft used twin pusher-type propellers chain driven by the 35 horsepower water-cooled motor, but the EX was built specifically for the stresses of exhibition flying. It carried no instruments, and Rodgers sat in an open chair located on the lower wing structure, completely exposed to the elements.

Armour also agreed to commission a three – car train to accompany the cross-country effort and to carry a contingent of mechanics and sup­port personnel, including the famed Charley Tay­
lor, who had built the Wright internal combus­tion engine used in the first successful flight of the Flyer at Kitty Hawk. The train, known as the “Vin Fiz Special,” was pulled by a steam engine, and consisted of a day coach, a Pull­man sleeping car, and a “hangar” car containing tools, spare parts, and a Palmer-Singer automo­bile with which to fetch Rodgers and return him to the Pullman at the end of each day. Both Cal’ s mother and his wife, Mabel, went along for moral support, as did a revolving assortment of friends, dignitaries, and newspaper reporters.

The adventure began on September 17, 1911 at the Sheepheads Bay Race Track on Long Island, where he lifted off to begin the first leg of the 4,000-mile odyssey (See Figure App 6-2.). His route would necessarily follow railroad tracks in order to make use of the “Vin Fiz Spe­cial” maintenance crew, but also because there were no navigation aids to guide his progress, nor were there any aerial charts, airports, or support facilities of any kind. The “iron compass,” the railroad tracks that would still be used to guide

the first airmail pilots later in the decade, ran westerly toward the great city of Chicago, on the far side of the daunting Allegheny Mountains. These same mountains would provide the great­est obstacle to the establishment of successful cross-country airmail in the years to come, but now they lay directly ahead of Rodgers.

Although exact historical sources are scarce, it appears that Rodgers elected to proceed north­west from Sheepheads Bay, to Middletown, New York, for his first leg of 84 miles, which he accom­plished easily and, as he said, he “didn’t even knock the ashes off my cigar.” But this pleasant beginning was not to be a harbinger of good things to come. Although the northwest route would avoid the harshest portions of the vaunted Allegh­enies, flat land it was not. The troubles began as he left Middleton when he crashed on takeoff. Diffi­culties continued as he made his way west toward Elmira, New York, then down into Pennsylvania, and finally on into the flat country of Ohio.

By October 9, 1911, Rodgers had made it only to Chicago. He was just one third of the way across the country and it was becoming obvious that the Hearst time limitation for the prize money
could not be met. He reached an accommodation with the Armour organization, nevertheless, to press on, prize or no prize. At Chicago the route turned south, partly because of the established rail lines and cities lying in that direction and partly to prepare for the southern circumvention of the highest portions of the Rocky Mountains. At stops along the way, crowds increased in size and enthusiasm. In Kansas City, the authorities closed the schools to celebrate the remarkable effort.

Enroute, the mechanics were kept busy refurbishing the Vin Fiz after the constant mis­haps encountered on takeoff and landings. An accurate tabulation of the number of crashes over the course of the journey is not available to us, but estimates range from sixteen to thirty – nine, depending on the prevailing distinction between a “hard landing” and a “crash.” Cal fared little better than the airplane, and he flew in bandages over most of the route and in leg casts over some of it.

By the time he and the Vin Fiz hobbled into Pasadena, California on November 5, 1911, it had been 49 days since he lifted off from the East Coast. A crowd estimated in number from

10,0 to 20,000 was there to greet him. He had made some 69 stops and had logged a total of 82 hours and 4 minutes airborne. But he was not quite through proving his point: he wanted the wheels of the Vin Fiz to kiss the Pacific waters. On November 12 he took off for the 20-mile hop to Long Beach and the Pacific Ocean only to experience after just 8 miles one of his worst crashes of all, at Compton. Rodgers was hospital­ized with internal injuries and a fractured ankle, and his recuperation forced a further delay until December 10, when he finally was able to com­plete his meandering and perilous coast-to-coast expedition. Crowds cheered as Rodgers taxied the weary Vin Fiz into the lapping surf of the Pacific, his ever-present cigar clenched in his teeth. It had been 84 days since he left Sheepheads Bay.

Cal Rodgers had become a celebrity, as his progress had been faithfully heralded by the coun­tries’ newspapers during the course of the journey. As King of the Tournament of Roses Parade on New Year’s Day 1912, he flew over the gathered marching bands and floats, dropping carnations to those assembled there. He was awarded a medal by the Aero Club of New York later that month, with President of the United States Taft in attendance.

Back in California on April 3, 1912, he was observed to take off from Long Beach, not far from where he had brought his continental odys­sey to its tortured end. He proceeded out over the Long Beach pier and was seen flying along with a flock of seagulls when his new Wright Model В suddenly dived into the Pacific Ocean. Calbraith Perry Rodgers did not survive. An investigation concluded that a seagull had been impacted by the airplane and had lodged between the articulating surfaces of the rudder, rendering control hopeless.

Cal Rodgers’ accomplishment has been relegated to the status of a footnote in the annals of aviation history, yet it stands as one of the many similar stories of the sacrifices of the gallant pioneers of flight. He was one of those who placed his love of flying and his capacity to endure ahead of his own safety and comfort.

« If you are looking for perfect safety, you will do well to sit on a fence and watch the birds; but if you really wish to learn, you must mount a machine and become acquainted with its tricks by actual trial.»

-Wilbur Wright, from an address to the Western Society of Engineers in Chicago, 18 September 1901.

In 1958, the airlines entered into the Mutual Aid Agreement (MAA), also called the Mutual Aid Pact (MAP), which amounted to a self-insured strike fund. This airline cooperative agreement was to be in place for the next 20 years, until deregulation. Under this arrangement, the largest nine trunk carriers in the United States contrib­uted to a fund from which amounts were paid to struck airlines to defray losses directly attribut­able to strike action. During the initial stage of MAP, the period 1958 to 1962, struck carriers received only “windfall benefits”—relatively small amounts equal to nonstruck carriers’ increased revenues realized due to the strikes. In the second stage of MAP, from 1962 to 1969, the plan assured that a struck carrier would recover at least an amount equal to 25 percent of the struck carrier’s normal operating expenses. In the third stage, between 1969 and 1978, the fund paid a struck carrier between 35 and 50 percent

of such expenses. At the beginning of the third stage, in 1970, local service carriers (feeder air­lines) came into the program, along with the trunk carrier Western Airlines.

The major beneficiary of the strike insurance was Northwest, which received over $187 million, followed by National ($120.1 million), and TWA ($37.1 million). The three major contributors to the fund were United, American, and Eastern, none of which had actually benefited from the fund.

The unions fought the MAP from its incep­tion in 1958, first before the CAB, which had to approve the plan, next by lobbying Congress, then by litigation brought in the courts, and finally in the collective bargaining arena. The unions lost on all fronts, and the MAP remained in force until the Airline Deregulation Act (ADA) passed Con­gress in 1978. The ADA provided that the MAP as approved by the CAB would terminate, and that any subsequent plan entered into by the air­lines would be constrained by very specific rules
and requirements. Thus far, the provisions of the ADA have effectively terminated the strike insur­ance fund of the airlines.

It should be noted that the MAP was used to great advantage by Texas International beginning with Frank Lorenzo’s takeover of that airline and during his battles with that airline’s unions in the early 1970s. During the period 1970 to 1974, Texas International received over $11 million from the fund, while paying in only $732,000. Rumblings of discontent over Lorenzo’s activi­ties were heard even from the other airlines.

Prior to 9-11, the legacy carriers copied the Southwest model only by creating subsidiary operations patterned along the lines of South­west, while maintaining their primary business models that evolved during CAB regulation. During the years following September 11, four of the five largest legacy carriers8 entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization, and in November 2011, the last holdout, American Airlines, also sought Chapter 11 protection. American is now in the process of attempting to slim down its cost structure and secure the benefits that ear­lier came to its competitors as a result of bank­ruptcy. Under Chapter 11, these airlines secured approval to make substantive changes to their basic structure, including eliminating employee pension plans, securing reductions in wages, amending work rules, cutting capacity, and downsizing generally. These changes are dis­cussed in more detail in Chapter 35.

A comparison of relevant indicators, includ­ing cost per available seat mile (CASM), between these carrier groups will disclose that the margin between the two groups is narrowing. As the first full decade of the 21st century closed, the legacy airlines had adopted many of the “no frills” standards of the LCCs, sometimes even exceeding the austere approach of the LCCs. In some instances, legacy airlines are now charg­ing extra fees for services that have always been included in the stated airfare. There appears to be no limit to what services the airlines will charge for: checked bags, snacks, early boarding, seat selection, blankets and pillows, ticket change, unaccompanied minor, pets in the cabin, and water (Spirit Airlines). One short-lived idea was a fee for use of the on-board bathrooms (Ryanair).

The next transformative development in the air transportation industry will be the implemen­tation of the NextGen policy (discussed at length in Chapter 35) now in the planning and earlier implementation stages in the Department of Transportation. Simply put, this complete trans­formation of the Air Traffic Control system from one of land-based navaids to a satellite-based nav­igation system, requiring on-board performance avionics and navigation capabilities, will likely drive new point-to-point operational models.

Endnotes

1. Source Air Transport Association—2012.

2. Kahn, Alfred E., The State of Competition in the Airline Industry, Statement before the U. S. House of Representa­tives Commission on the Judiciary, June 14, 2000.

3. Wall Street Journal, December 29-30, 2012.

4. A full-time equivalent is equal to two part-time employees.

5. The first three waves are suggested by Robert W. Poole,

Jr. and Viggo Butler, “Airline Deregulation: The Unfinished Revolution," Reason Public Policy Institute.

6. Earlier in the decade, before the mergers of Delta and North­west and United and Continental, Southwest was number two in size, measured by the number of passengers carried.

7. Miles, Richard B., Testimony before the Aviation Subcom­mittee, Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, U. S. House of Representatives, Competition in the U. S. Aircraft Manufacturing Industry, June 26, 2001.

8. United Airlines, Northwest Airlines, Delta Airlines, and US Airways.

The United States has the largest, most exten­sive airport system in the world. There are some 19,700 airports in the United States, ranging from world-class international airports to grass strips. Most of these airports are small, private fields, but 5,300 of these airports are for public use. Of these, 3,356 are designated as part of the National Airport System (NAS). NAS airports are entitled to federal aid, and they are categorized by the FAA as follows:

Commercial Service Airports (503 air­ports) are publicly owned airports that have at least 2,500 passenger boardings each
calendar year and receive scheduled passen­ger service. Of these:

382 are primary airports designated as large, medium, small, or nonhub, with more than 10,000 passenger boardings per year; and

121 nonprimary airports with between 2,500 and 9,999 passenger boardings per year

Reliever Airports (269 airports) are desig­nated by the FAA to relieve congestion at Commercial Service Airports and to provide improved general aviation access.

General Aviation Airports (2,560 airports) comprise the remaining airports including privately owned, public use airports that enplane more than 2,500 passengers annu­ally and receive scheduled airline service.

All of these airports are included in the FAA’s National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems.

Since 2007 air traffic hubs are designated as geographical areas based on the percentage of total passengers enplaned in the area. Under this designation, a hub may have more than one airport in it. (This definition of hub should not be confused with the definition used by the airlines in describing their "hub-and-spoke” route structures). Individual communities fall into four hub classifications as determined by each community’s per­centage of total enplaned revenue passengers in all services and all operations of U. S. certificated route carriers within the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and other U. S. areas. For 2004-2006, hub designation is based on passenger boardings at individual airports as designated by the FAA. Classifications are based on the percentage of total enplaned revenue passengers for each year according to the following: Large = 1 percent or more, Medium = 0.25 to 0.9999 percent, Small = 0.05 to 0.249 percent, Nonhub = less than 0.05.

SOURCE: U. S. Department of Transportation, Research and Innovative Technology Administration, Bureau of Transportation Statistics, Office of Airline Information, Airport Activity Statistics Database (Form 41 Schedule T-3), special tabulation, October 2010.

TABLE 33-1 Domestic enplanements at U. S. airports: 2004-2010.

A limited number of these airports have contracted out some of their operations to private, commercial management, primarily at medium hub airports.2 Airports are further classified by the FAA on the basis of percentages:

9 Large hub airports (at least 1.0 percent of total national enplanements)

• Medium hub airports (less than 1.0 percent but more than.25 percent of total national enplanements)

• Small hub airports (less than.25 percent but more than.05 percent of total national enplanements)

• Non-hub airports

Even though commercial airports are mostly publicly owned, private enterprise plays a sig­nificant role in their operation. Private companies provide 90 percent of the employees who work at these airports, or work for the airlines them­selves, or concessionaires and contractors.

ИА recession is when you have to tighten your belt; depression is when you have no belt to tighten. When you’ve lost your trousers—you’re in the airline business, w

Sir Adam Thomson

|l| s the airline industry approached the end of

t I the millennium, during the first half of the 1990s, there was no consensus that deregulation was an overall success. Economic deregulation was clearly a boon for mass transit; air fares had plummeted as predicted. But the industry was in disarray. Between 1990 and 1993, airlines in the United States had lost an amount of money equal to all the money that had ever been made in aviation in this country since the first commercial flight. If this was what deregulation had wrought, then deregulation was obviously a tragic mistake.

Deregulation had clearly exposed the sen­sitive nature of the U. S. airline industry. This sensitivity results primarily from fluctuating eco­nomic conditions, often driven by geopolitical factors that affect fuel prices and travel demand. While deregulation gave air travel to the masses, it did so at the expense of the airlines’ flexibility
and any financial cushion in the industry. Com­petition had shaved profit margins so razor thin that almost any economic hiccup translated into severe problems for air transportation. The industry has high fixed costs (the cost of labor, aircraft, and facilities) that cannot be reduced quickly during these adverse economic times. Since fuel and labor costs account for over 50 percent of all airlines’ expenses, spikes in the cost of fuel are particularly debilitating to the airlines.

The last decade of the 20th century was quite representative of the plight of the airlines: boom or bust. Jet fuel prices doubled in just four months in 1990 due to the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq. Eastern Airlines had been liquidated, fol­lowed by Pan American. Thus deregulation had taken out the venerable airline of Eddie Ricken – backer and as well as the “Chosen Instrument” of America. The remaining legacy airlines took on crushing debt trying to stay in business. The economic downturn produced huge losses for the airlines until 1995. The state of the airline indus­try was so fragile that a presidential commission was established to look into ways to ensure the survival of the industry. There was talk of nation­alizing the airlines.

9 Southwest Airlines

Only Southwest Airlines seemed to understand what was going on. While the major airlines were trying without much success to stop the bleeding, Southwest was raking in record profits; it was also expanding. USAir had acquired PSA in California, and then began to cut back service on the north-south corridor. Southwest came in to fill the void, but at offbeat airports like Oakland and Burbank, and at seemingly ever decreasing fares. Then Southwest entered San Jose to chal­lenge American Airlines. When told that South­west was coming in, American did not even wait for the discount carrier to arrive; it withdrew, anticipating the losses to come in a one-on-one contest with Southwest.

«If the Wright brothers were alive today Wilbur would have to fire Orville to reduce costs. 99

Herb Kelleher, Southwest Airlines, USA Today, 8 June 1994

Southwest was also headed east, for the first time in its history. Now Southwest would be in Baltimore (BWI), next to the seat of power in the District of Columbia. Southwest then was the eighth largest airline in the United States (United was first, followed by American, Delta, Northwest, Continental, and USAir), but it was different in at least one highly signifi­cant way: it had point-to-point routes (the 100 city-pairs most frequently traveled), and did not waste time getting in and out of large hub terminals.

The overall result of these changes in the legacy carriers’ structure is to make them look more like the low-cost carriers with which they have com­peted under deregulation. Not only are the legacy carriers structured more like the LCCs, they are beginning to adopt their operating practices as well. The lower fare structure of the new legacy airlines removes a major advantage previously held by the low-cost carriers. At the same time, the low-cost carriers are beginning to look more like the legacy carriers, causing a convergence between the two groups as they pursue the airline traveler dollar under a maturing deregulated air transportation sys­tem. The third group that makes up what comprises the majority of the domestic air transport system, the regional carriers, have also gone through a transformation as these changes roll downhill.

While the DOT classifies airlines as “majors” (20), “nationals” (33), or “regionals” (31) based strictly on revenues, this classification is not help­ful in differentiating between the actual functions of the various groups. For instance, American Eagle is classified as a “major” airline due to its revenue, but its operations conform to what a regional or feeder airline does. A more practi­cal classifying of airlines would separate them into legacy (or network or incumbent) airlines, low-cost carriers (LCCs), and regional airlines. By now, we know that the legacy airlines are the surviving car­riers that operated during the period of CAB regu­lation; the LCCs are the “no frills” airlines that are either new entrant airlines (since 1978) or airlines that operated wholly intrastate during the CAB period; and regional airlines are those airlines that now operate as feeder airlines, mainly to the legacy carriers. Legacy carriers and LCCs are sometimes referred to as “mainline” carriers. A fourth group of carriers, not discussed here, are “commuters” (61), which operate aircraft of 60 or fewer seats or have a maximum payload of 18,000 pounds or less.

XI The New Legacy Airlines

As a result of the bankruptcies and mergers of the legacy carriers beginning in 2002, this group of airlines has emerged as viable contenders with the LCCs. The new legacy airlines are United, Delta, US Airways (before the pending merger with American), and American Airlines. Dur­ing the first decade of the 21st century, these airlines (representing also the absorbed Conti­nental, Northwest, TWA, and America West) contracted their networks, route miles, number of employees, and number of aircraft, while focus­ing on down-sizing, cost-cutting, and improving productivity.

They began to emphasize Internet ticket pur­chasing and distribution and web check-in. These newly oriented carriers began to mimic other LCC practices by eliminating or reducing ser­vices and amenities that had come to be standard as the legacy brand, such as meals, soft drinks, snacks, and pillows.

By 2008, these airlines began to levy fees, in addition to the base airline fare, for services and amenities that had always been complimentary to their passengers. These add-on fees include, depending on the airline, ticket change fee, ticket cancellation fee, booking fee for phone or in per­son, seat selection fee, unaccompanied minor fee, pet in cabin fee, fees for checked bags, oversized bags, and overweight bags, early boarding fee, seat selection upgrade fee, wireless Internet fee, blanket and pillow sets fee, inflight entertainment fee, and inflight food and beverage charges. See Figure 35-23 for a depiction of select fees and the locations where offered for purchase. See

Tables 35-3 and 35-4 for a listing of airlines and airlines’ imposed fees for optional services.

The legacy carriers have, however, main­tained business and first class services, which render much higher yields than standard. The legacy carriers also have the advantage of flying more profitable international routes as a result of global deregulation and Open Skies agreements.