Air Traffic Control

The commercialization of air traffic control is a much more difficult subject to broach than is the privatization of airports. The world leader in private aviation is the United States, and the

United States remains the chief training venue in the world for both U. S. and foreign civilian pilots, with its training facilities, cheaper avia­tion fuel, good weather, and vast territory. The very large civilian private pilot population of the United States and its chief lobbying representa­tive, the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Associa­tion, along with general aviation business aircraft operators and their organization, the National Business Aircraft Association, are dedicated to keeping the skies over America basically free from government-based user charges (other than aviation fuel taxes and landing fees at some air­ports). The airlines are on the other side of this issue, advocating the inclusion of general avia­tion aircraft in a regimen based on usage. A sys­tem of user charges has historically been utilized in any commercialization of АТС services. The question of commercialization of АТС services, therefore, becomes a very real political issue.

The fact remains that in the United States the FAA, like airports, is a governmental-funded undertaking. The FAA budget in the United States for the fiscal year 2011 was somewhere around $16.4 billion. Of that total, $9.7 million went to “operations,” which includes $7.6 billion for air traffic control operations, $1.3 billion for safety regulation and certification, $3.3 billion for capital investments in АТС facilities, equip­ment, and research (which presumably includes NextGen expenditures) and the rest for grants to state and local governments for airport investments.

According to the Government Accounting Office consistently over the years, the FAA has also been criticized as not being set up to effec­tively manage the development of large projects, resulting in delays and cost overruns on major technology developments and their implementa­tion. The Advanced Automation System project, for instance, was begun in the early 1980s at a projected cost of $2.5 million to be completed in 1996. By 1994, project costs were estimated to be $7.6 billion and the project was seven years behind schedule. A study by the DOT’S Office of Inspector General in 2005 reviewed 16 other major АТС projects and found that the combined costs had gone from $8.9 billion to $14.5 billion.9 Many of the same concerns are heard about FAA management acumen and pro­cedures as the NextGen overhaul proceeds. The question occurs whether private enterprise could do the job better.

While there is no doubt that commercializa­tion of АТС services is a global trend, the ques­tion remains whether it is the right answer for the United States. The commercialization of АТС services has been an expanding phenomenon elsewhere in the world since 1972. By 2005, at least 40 countries had fundamentally restructured their АТС systems. All of these countries have shifted from a tax-funded base to direct user fees. In a 2009 article based on a study compar­ing 10 commercialized АТС systems with the FAA АТС system,10 the author concludes that the commercialized systems improved service qual­ity, modernized workplace technologies, main­tained or improved safety, and reduced costs. The study also concludes that other risks of com­mercialization, such as erosion of accountability to government, deterioration of labor relations, or worsened relationships between civil and mili­tary air traffic controllers, did not materialize.

The study includes analyses of air navigation systems of Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, South Africa, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, contrasting those with the FAA system in the United States. Among the advantages of reform­ing their air navigation systems as compared to the FAA system were the still lingering problems in the FAA of failing to take advantage of off-the – shelf solutions to problems, overdevelopment, duplicate procurement systems, political interfer­ence that resulted in building unneeded facili­ties, inability to apply business principles, overly bureaucratic and inefficient approval processes, and little client input to help establish priorities.

The labor record at the FAA has also been a problem impacting costs. From the period of the 1960s, some degree of labor unrest has been seen. In 1969, members of the controllers’ PATCO union began the strategy of isolated “sick ins,” and in 1970 some 3000 controllers took part in an organized “sick in” causing extensive disruption in the nation’s air traffic system. These strategies con­tinued through the 1970s, and culminated with the PATCO strike in 1981, discussed in Chapter 29.

Today, FAA employees involved in opera­tions number some 43,000, who are paid a total of $6.5 billion in wages and benefits, or about $151,000 per employee. Controllers, as a group, have compensation packages of about $166,000 each, per year. Labor accounts for two-thirds of the cost of FAA operations.11