Working With Canada, Mexico, On RVSM

Hoping to stay ahead of the workload once RVSM is enacted, the FAA is reportedly rolling out new technology and new techniques in an airspace that will look very different after January 20th.

That's when the new RVSM goes into effect, lowering the vertical separation between aircraft at flight levels to a thousand feet. The airspace change goes into effect simultaneously throughout the US, Mexico and Canada.

"We’re redesigning the airspace, building new air traffic control towers, installing new radar systems, expanding the use of Global Positioning System technologies, and equipping facilities with new weather detecting products," said FAA chief operation officer Russ Chew Wednesday at an event sponsored by the Aviation Safety Alliance. He was quoted by Government Computer News. "There is no lack of good ideas and technical solutions."

Of course, there may be a lack of money to pay for the technical solutions -- or a lack of money to hire the people who would operate those technical solutions.

Right now, ten of the FAA's En Route Centers have an automated system called the User Request Evaluation Tool to help them minimize conflicts and provide pilots with more direct routings. In fact, once the other centers have been so equipped, the FAA predicts the number of direct routings will increase by 15-percent.

FMI: www.faa.gov