DOT Asks Airlines To Come To Agreement On Cutting Back

The Department of Transportation's much-bandied airline summit on efforts to restrict capacity at New York's JFK International Airport kicked off Tuesday.

"We have a serious problem at John F. Kennedy International Airport. The chronic delays too many have experienced at JFK impact travelers to and from New York, and across the entire aviation system," said DOT Secretary Mary Peters. "President Bush has made it clear that the conditions travelers experienced this summer are unacceptable and must be fixed. When nearly a third of scheduled flights are cancelled or delayed… when passengers are stranded for hours on runways… it is easy to understand why consumer frustration is reaching the boiling point.

"The President has tasked me with finding solutions to this problem and with providing as much relief to travelers as we can in the shortest amount of time possible."

As ANN reported, Peters (right) put the call out October 12 for representatives of the airline industry and the FAA to meet, and discuss ways to voluntary restrict flights at JFK during the busiest hours of the day... which, anymore, is pretty much any time the sun is shining. She also charged a group of airline, airport and travel officials with developing a series of additional measures to reduce congestion at New York’s three major airports before the start of the 2008 summer travel season.

The DOT notes airlines at JFK increased their scheduled operations by 41 percent between March 2006 and August 2007. As a result, the number of arrival delays exceeding one hour increased by 114 percent in the first 10 months of fiscal year 2007, compared to the same period the previous year.

During June and July 2007, on-time arrival performance at JFK was only 59 percent, she said.

Last week, DOT release its target figures for flight restrictions at JFK: from 0600 to 2159 local time daily, the target for the number of flights per hour is 80 -- except for 1500 to 1859, when the target will be 81 flights. To better space flights throughout an entire hour, the Department also set a 30-minute maximum of total flights at 44, and the 15-minute maximum at 24 flights.

In addition, the number of arrivals or departures may not exceed 53 in any one hour period, 29 in any 30-minute period or 16 in any 15-minute period.

Peters stressed at Tuesday's opening session she doesn't want to give any airline an advantage,

"I am not in favor of a system that limits competition, nor do I want to reduce the ability of new entrants to fly into New York<" she said. "We are serious about exploring all options to reduce congestion in the New York region, and we must consider schedule reductions.

"Today is the day to think about the passengers," she said. "We have got to make sure the options customers have are real."

Given that Peters speaks of an industry that routinely overschedules operations -- and overbooks flights -- we'll have to wait and see on how successful those efforts will be.

FMI: www.dot.gov