DMD3.
Pre-takeoff checklist
Would you get charged a fee if you obtained Flight Following, but did not file a VFR flight plan?
Big Airline push to Privatize ATC - User Fees
- Thread starter SCCutler
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Bob Noel
Nope. There are a few parts of the Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) that deal with mistakes in the bid. If a mistake was made by the offeror and the contracting officials didn't have sufficient information to have been able to see error, then the FARs prohibit $$$ from being added to the contract.
wsuffa
Touchdown! Greaser!
This should not come as a surprise to anyone.
It depends on how the system gets set up, but in most places if you operate "in the system" you get charged system fee. If you only talk to towers, you only pay tower fees. If you only get briefings, you only pay briefing fees. If you don't talk to anyone, you pay no fees except airport fees. If you don't use airports, you pay nothing.
Approach_controller
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Approach_controller
Lockheed Martin has the FSS contact which makes them responsible for dissemination of NOTAMS. I'm sure there is a provision in the contract they signed preventing addition or subtraction of assigned duties.
wilkersk
Pattern Altitude
I would think operating "ala carte" this way would be prohibitively expensive. I hope if the system does get privatized that they come up with some kind of pricing scheme that won't completely kill recreational flying.
wilkersk
Pattern Altitude
Here's a paragraph from Nav Canada's website describing fee structure for GA light aircraft in lieu of "per service" ala carte fees.
beestforwardspeed
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CoopAir
On that note, with a system like that in Europe, I always wonder how many guys over there fly in IMC without talking to anyone, with their Xper turned off.
What a way to increase safely
Tax the fuel to pay for ATC. Same as roads. Few politicians can stand up to the oil lobby however. Otherwise we will end up with the mafia owning airways and roads. Wake up people. Theres a reason roads and airports are government owned. Good reasons. We tried the toll roads, back in the 1400's. That didnt work.
Actually it's not too bad the places I've used it. In Aus you get an Air Services account and you get a card that works like a credit card and it's a central billing function. It creates no greater cost than any of the rest of the consumer financial card purchase system you already accept.
It's funny, we complain that government doesn't run efficiently like business, yet we will not ALLOW government to run like business, because if government runs like business, we call it Communism! (Which by the way has ZERO constitutional prohibitions, and actually, Communism was created as a development of the American Founders thinking, but advanced to deal with the realities, and new possibilities, brought about by the industrial revolution.)
wilkersk
Pattern Altitude
I was looking for 2015 Nav Canada annual flat fee rate for domestic light aircraft. The latest one I can find is for 2013. And, its (CA)$68. That's $68 for the whole year, as long as you're not operating from one of the 7 listed international airports. Not bad, if they do in fact operate more efficiently than the system we have.
Maybe one of our Canadian friends can chime in here.....?
Maybe one of our Canadian friends can chime in here.....?
wilkersk
Pattern Altitude
So, if we privatize ATC here in the US, it sounds like it would be a federally chartered corporation. How would we do this and not end up with problems similar to what we have in the Federally chartered bank corps. that have caused such an upheaval in the financial industry, not once, but several times? What happens when we have an ATC financial crisis? Would the federal government have to step in to save our "too-big-to-fail" ATC system?
petrolero
Pattern Altitude
I saw some chiding early in the thread about those who desire "small government" -- as if this were that. 
It's not.
Just because something is run by a private company doesn't mean it's necessarily "privatized" in the sense of free market competition, freedom to innovate and cut costs and negotiate with labor (represented or not) etc. In fact, it's often just contracting out the exact same government services that the government was providing and all services and wages (Davis-Bacon Act) are set to certain requirements by contract and law.
It's not like Google or Amazon or Apple would be running ATC with free rein to chop costs like they do for their free market businesses. There could be some room for innovation but it still has to be run through the same bureaucratic gauntlet as always. LockMart has improved FSS in my opinion but it has taken a very long time for them to get where they are today.
But what it would do, as others have pointed out, is add new costs in the form of fees on top of the fuel taxes we already pay. This is similar to toll roads. City governments love toll roads because they can install them and have them ostensibly "paid for" without any tax cut or rebate or even quid pro quo.
It's not.Just because something is run by a private company doesn't mean it's necessarily "privatized" in the sense of free market competition, freedom to innovate and cut costs and negotiate with labor (represented or not) etc. In fact, it's often just contracting out the exact same government services that the government was providing and all services and wages (Davis-Bacon Act) are set to certain requirements by contract and law.
It's not like Google or Amazon or Apple would be running ATC with free rein to chop costs like they do for their free market businesses. There could be some room for innovation but it still has to be run through the same bureaucratic gauntlet as always. LockMart has improved FSS in my opinion but it has taken a very long time for them to get where they are today.
But what it would do, as others have pointed out, is add new costs in the form of fees on top of the fuel taxes we already pay. This is similar to toll roads. City governments love toll roads because they can install them and have them ostensibly "paid for" without any tax cut or rebate or even quid pro quo.
Well, because the Federally Chartered banks are a thin guise for feudalist control which generates huge cash flow and profits magnitudinal orders of magnitude greater than anything aviation could ever provide. The people who destroy the capital markets are not interested in this market, so the risks involved are very low. In fact, it's in their greatest benefit to keep the price low.
Nice op-ed piece in response
http://www.crainsnewyork.com/articl...plan-to-privatize-nations-air-traffic-control
http://www.crainsnewyork.com/articl...plan-to-privatize-nations-air-traffic-control
actually, it is. And I love it.I saw some chiding early in the thread about those who desire "small government" -- as if this were that.
often you see posts around here from tea party types just salivating over any chance to outsource any part of the federal government under the guise of cost savings. yet, when the cost savings comes at their own expense, the retreat comes post haste. I absolutely love it.
The reality is it never comes as cost savings to the public. None of these privatized systems actually save the public money, they just increase the margin the market gets. Do you think the LM contract is cheaper than FSS could have done it by upgrading the technology? What overall economic impact do you believe it to have had?
I posted that to the first page and the article with statistics to back it up. Do you just like to hear yourself talk?
Who the **** do you think you are, and why the **** do you feel the need to say this? Are you just an ******* at heart and need to spew out crap? What kind of demented self loathing putz **** are you? Do you kick dogs for no reason?
woah, settle down there. You'll waste all your energy. Then who will troll around the forums spewing all the clueless BS that you normally do?Who the **** do you think you are, and why the ****mdo you feel they say this? Are you just an ******* at heart and need to spew out crap? What kind of demented self loathing puts are you? Do you kick dogs for no reason?
I have plenty of energy, I feed on human weakness and stupidity, there is no shortage here.
Now answer the question, "why?"
Not as long as you're around.
Isn't there a boat somewhere that needs to be crashed into a dock?
So, why do you feel the need to challenge me?
I find it interesting when people produce a challenge of no substance, nor use, just to show that your anal sphincter envelopes your entire persona.So, let's hear your motivation....
That wasn't clear? You're a clueless, pontificating, loudmouth, know-it-all ass
the exact reason I spend as little time as possibly with other pilots of your ilk
That wasn't clear? You're a clueless, pontificating, loudmouth, know-it-all ass
the exact reason I spend as little time as possibly with other pilots
If I am clueless, yet agree with you, doesn't that make you clueless too?
Again, you are not addressing the question of motivation to action. Why did you feel the need to comment the original comment? Since it was in aggreance rather than argument, the only result you could possibly generate is proving that you are a bigger ass than I.
Pontificating is not a negative quality. It's really not hip to be stupid regardless what you see on Family Guy.
No more fighting
No more fun
First one to hit
Or crack a smile
Has to run
A half a mile
No more fun
First one to hit
Or crack a smile
Has to run
A half a mile
MMMkay
So, why are you avoiding the question?
Don't want to face your personal demons? Daddy didn't give you enough attention?by god if you just keep posting more drivel sooner or later you'll "win"So, why are you avoiding the question?
am I right?
Mike Strader
Filing Flight Plan
Comments coming out of the congress seam to support farming out ATC. I don't support the action, but I can see how some would be misled into the position. Small GA would feel the pain. Corporate flight departments will not like it, but they have the ability to pay. The airlines will just bundle the cost into the price of your ticket.
wsuffa
Touchdown! Greaser!
Correct. Any so-called savings the airlines see will go to increased margin. It's exactly what happened when the excise taxes on airline tickets went away for a while - the final all-in ticket prices to the public didn't go down, but the ratcheted up a bit more when the tax was restored. Same thing with fuel surcharges these days - fuel savings goes to profit, not cost reduction.
The airlines profit center is the a la carte fee structure for bag fees, premium seating, ticket change charges, food, fuel surcharges, etc. If the corporation running ATC operates in a similar fashion, you'd see a base price for filing a flight plan & basic ATC services, another charge if you changed it, another charge for in-flight reroute, another charge for landing at towered airports (and higher fee for airline airports), and so forth. There might be time-of-day surcharges.
Any "non-profit" corporation can earn a "profit" (though it's not called that), and spend that extra money on new systems, unnecessary items, high executive salaries, bonuses and the like. To stir a pot, AOPA is a non-profit, yet the president flys around in a jet.
wsuffa
Touchdown! Greaser!
Sure. The government has taken the position of "managing traffic" through a dynamic fee structure, often through public-private partnerships. The DoT has supported toll roads along interstate highways with dynamic tolling structures for vehicles using the roads. Many in the public call them "Lexus Lanes".
http://wamu.org/news/12/04/01/dynamic_tolling_coming_to_virginia_express_lanes
Google "dynamic tolling"
How do I 'win' when there is no competition? I cannot win from this dialogue at all, as I have no real stake in it, there is nothing of significance to me here. You on the other hand stand to 'win' if you think about why you felt you had to 'challenge' me and 'win' something.You have nothing I want, nor do you have the ability to take from me, so winning doesn't even apply; unless of course I make you think, and that makes you decide to make better choices in the future. Then I win some karma points, they're jokers in the deck of cards life deals. They're really the only thing worth playing for. Doubtful you provide any though.
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I think that eventually there will be some kind of regulated structuring for fare quoting that is going to become required, because this model of every everyone having a different 'add on' pricing structure is getting out of hand. Ala carte pricing for bags is fine with me, no worries, standardize it across the industry so one can accurately compare offers. As it is now is stupid.
Gov't very, very 'spensive fellas. . .been an employee, been a contractor; local, federal. . .most places, if a quarter of the work force was eaten by zombies, the impact on production would be invisible. The fraction varies from agency to agency, of course. . .I mean, all of Department of Energy could disappear without any meaningful impact (except to the employees and contractors). . .USMC? Probably need most of them. FAA somewhere in between - using some resources to do stuff with no value added, other stuff very necessary. Dropping big bucks on marginal value systems, with real sktchy msnagement, too.
I'd be happy if the feds did less with less. I'll gag up $70 per year if FAA cuts 20% of their management work force.
I'd be happy if the feds did less with less. I'll gag up $70 per year if FAA cuts 20% of their management work force.
You have nothing I want, nor do you have the ability to take from me, so winning doesn't even apply; unless of course I make you think, and that makes you decide to make better choices in the future. Then I win some karma points, they're jokers in the deck of cards life deals. They're really the only thing worth playing for. Doubtful you provide any though.
Am I just sleepy, or is this incoherent?
mkosmo
Pattern Altitude
You mean like we already do?
roncachamp
Final Approach
Can anyone explain what problems there are currently in ATC that would be solved by farming it out? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?
The cost of retirement benefits and the high pay scale is likely what they are trying to address.
roncachamp
Final Approach
But those are not ATC problems.