Needless to say, I concur with the Department of Transportation. Landing slots are a scarce public resource that are being overused because they're underpriced.
If slots were allocated by auction, these high demand slots would increase in price, which would change the economics of the tickets, making it less worthwhile to overschedule. This wouldn't merely benefit passengers currently being deluded about the wait time on their flights, because delays have a tendency to cascade. I've seen estimates that a third of all airplane delays in the US originate in one of the three major New York airports.Mayer and Sinai's study also identified the real culprit: the deliberate overscheduling of flights at peak periods by major airlines trying to increase the amount of connecting traffic at their hub airports. Major airlines like United, Delta, and American use a hub-and-spoke model as a way to offer consumers more flight choices and to save money by centralizing operations. Most of the traffic they send through a hub is on the way to somewhere else. (Low-cost carriers, on the other hand, typically carry passengers from one point to another without offering many connections.) Overscheduling at the hubs can't explain all delays--weather and maintenance problems also contribute. But nationally, about 75 percent of flights go in or out of hub airports, making overscheduling the most important factor.
American Airlines, for example, uses O'Hare as a hub and schedules a cluster of flights to arrive there from the east in the earlier afternoon. Another cluster leaves for points west and south soon after. In the 30-minute period between 2:45 p.m. and 3:15 p.m., American has scheduled about 18 takeoffs, not counting its regional flights. That comes close to maxing out the airport's capacity, without any other airline. Other airports are even more extreme. Continental has seven flights scheduled to depart during the exact same minute (11:45 a.m.) out of Newark, as well as almost 20 other flights in the surrounding half hour. Some of these flights leave late more than 80 percent of the time. The major airlines know perfectly well that these hideous statistics are inevitable.
Meanwhile, the auctions would provide the funds to upgrade America's air traffic control system, which desperately need it.
The auctions would change not merely the scheduling of flights, but the mix of flights that airlines run. Airlines have been steadily shifting towards regional jets, which makes sense for them because it allows them to offer more flights to any one destination. Since landing slots in New York are priced based on the weight of the plane, there's no penalty for doing so.
But the primary cost of running a plane out of LaGuardia now isn't the wear and tear on the tarmac; it's the spot that a plane takes up in saturated airspace. A 60 seat regional jet takes up as much space in that queue as a 747. If we moved to a system of auctions, with airlines having to pay for desireable time slots, many of the regional jets would become less profitable. We'd probably see fewer flights with bigger planes. That, too, would help reduce congestion.
This wouldn't be good for everyone. Airlines schedule this way, as Goolsbee points out, so they can maximize connections. Spreading out flights means longer layovers (though perhaps not, on average, since the number of delays, missed connections, and cancelled flights would drop. It would also mean that some areas wouldn't get as much service, or would get service at less convenient times, because their population can't support frequent large flights. Look at who's sponsoring the bill to block the DOT's proposal. Schumer and Clinton, who like regional jets servicing upstate New York. Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey, who joins the Port Authority in wanting to maximize the absolute number of flights. And . . . Liddy Dole, with a lot of constituents enjoying frequent small-jet flights to Raleigh-Durham.
But for most people, especially in the crowded coastal corridors, this would be an improvement. At this point, only a little more than half of all flights to New York are on time, thanks to the massive overcrowding.
Jeez, hit the snooze button on this one. It's like discussing taxicab medallions.
Overscheduling at the hubs can't explain all delays--weather and maintenance problems also contribute.
I think a combination of over scheduling and weather are the big culprits. Some of the over scheduling is done and there is no way that many planes could safely land even in the best of conditions. Some of the over scheduling is because weather changes how much time is required between each planes. If you always schedule for perfect weather, but rarely see it, then you'll be constantly running behind.
The study Goolsbee quotes was written by someone who doesn't follow airlines closely and misses the real issues. Connecting hubs are totally irrelevant. While it makes perfect (conceptual) sense to use price to action scare airport/airway capacity none of the DOT approaches really do that. You post notes several of the key issues, but be careful of simple assumptions about any “solutions”
Serious congestion problems are predominately in the Northeast, not at big connecting hubs (ATL, DFW, DEN etc). The problem in the Northeast is that AA/DL/US use hundreds of small planes to fill LGA/BOS/DCA to keep low cost carriers out of these markets. Thus these markets have the highest airfares in the country. Small planes don't block competition or cause big delay problems in Houston or Detroit.
There are no good guys in the political discussion and the DOT is not trying to reduce congestions or help consumers. They are just using half baked versions of "congestion charges" to cover up their horrible performance fixing FAA problems and upgrading national airways capacity. The airlines keep claiming that past operations at LaGuardia created a permanent “property right” so they can block competition without ever paying for the scarce airport rights (just like broadcasters getting the government to give them full “property rights” in the broadcast spectrum for free). The Port Authority wants full control over the same “property rights”, and since they are a monopoly provider of New York airports, they could raise fees without ever spending the increased money on new capacity or service. The screaming politicians are either beholden to the big airlines or to corporate aviation—any system to create a real market for allocating scarce aviation capacity would shift MUCH higher costs on all the executive jets headed for Teterboro (or Van Nuys or other big city airports). No one in this debate is the least bit serious about real solutions to any of these issues.
If you impose a user charge on airline all you are doing is transferring the economic rent from the scarce resource from the airline to the government and/or airport.
This does not necessarily imply that the airlines will change their behavior. The reason that flight are concentrated at certain times is a combination of (1) that is what consumer want and (2) it is the optimal use of the airlines resources.
But I will give you your assumption that airlines will change their schedules.
The trade-off will be some reduction in congestion and delays versus fewer flights at the times most desired by fliers if not fewer flights overall. And fliers will have to pay more for this.
Are you sure this would generate a net improvement in welfare--I'm not.
Would this also reduce Boeing's advantage over Air Bus? Right now boeing is more fuel efficient and smaller. Reduce the demand for flexability and efficiency and you might end up with more air buses.
Aaron-
It would increase demand for both Boeing and Airbus, since the planes which would (theoretically) be priced out are regional jets, made by Canadian and Brazilian companies.
I'm not so sure about the reason offered for Liddy Dole. Charlotte, NC is one of major hubs for traffic serving the South, and I've flown thru it several times on route to the West Coast. Thus, while her opposition makes sense for Raleigh-Durham, it doesnt make sense for Charlotte. Maybe all the Charlotte folks are Democrats.
hhoran writes: "any system to create a real market for allocating scarce aviation capacity would shift MUCH higher costs on all the executive jets headed for Teterboro (or Van Nuys or other big city airports)"
I'm with you right up until you get to this point. Private jets (be they corporate owned, leased, or simply rented) are not the problem because they aren't tying up landing slots at high traffic airports like LaGuardia - they're simply passing through.
Private planes (be they jet or prop) simply aren't tying up ATC resources like the airlines are.
When you fly an airplane into a major airport you talk to approach control, tower, and then ground control. When you leave, it's departure control, ground control, tower, departure (If I remember right).
At a major airport each of those groups is a large team of controllers. At less busy airports you have smaller teams. At low traffic airports those groups collapse to roles on one team and eventually you get to airports where you simply self announce over the radio.
Private planes (be they prop or jet) tend to stay at lower traffic airports because going to a high traffic airport is, well, a pain the ass and kind of defeats the purpose of having a private plane. So, private plane pilots are talking less frequently to controllers and taking up less of their very valuable time.
Just as an FYI: I've seen a Cessna Citation, a small business jet, get into and out of a small uncontrolled airfield.
And, while it's true that private planes are going to have to talk to ATC when transitioning through the traffic area of major airport (while departing from or arriving at a minor airport) again they're not taking up as much of the controllers' time doing that. You talk to approach, departure, and then you're done - because then you're outside their area of control.
MarcInSeattle:
Not quite - TEB is dead under the approach path for 22L at EWR. All south flow EWR traffic crosses TEB at 3k, and all TEB outbounds must be sequenced around it.
The NE cluster is not pavement-limited, it's approach corridor limited. Check out an RNAV STAR for any of the five hubs there - Ohio to NYC generally goes over upstate NY just to get sequenced in with international inbound.
NYC outbound is even worse. The area is ringed with departure "gates", and if any of the gates get shut down due to weather, every other gate gets overloaded with reroutes. You can sit around on a CAVU day and tower will be taking a departure every five minutes because two fixes are shut down.
There is no pavement shortage (except maybe at LGA), and anyone who tells you otherwise is trying to pork up a construction project.
Boston to DC, on the other hand, is an airspace disaster.
As a former controller:
Minor correction: a 747 does theoretically tie up more space on final and the runway than a commuter due to wake turbulence rules, but it's not anywhere near proportional to the size difference (about 5:3) Counterbalancing this is the fact that a 747 flies faster except very close to the runway, and therefore gets out of the way of traffic behind, while the regional commuter craft tend to be slower and traffic stacks up behind them if you don't spend a lot of time making certain they don't.
The biggest problem, though, is aircraft of varying speeds, particularly on final. After departure, the departures controller can "spray" the planes so courses diverge in most cases, and a good ground controller won't put two aircraft departing on the same route next to each other in the departures queue. But on final, they're all airborne, and the speed ranges they can fly are pretty much set by aircraft design. Over twenty years ago, the saying was "You know it's going to be a bad day when it's arrival crunch and you've got a Citation (notoriously slow for a jet) leading the pack." Large commercial aircraft tend to be faster than smaller ones.
Politically, the auctioning off of landing times is difficult because of AOPA - the private pilots association, which has an outsize amount of political clout. The airlines just pass the charges along to the people who want to fly during peak times, but they make the private and corporate aviation world *howl*. The corporate at the costs and the fact that they have to consider alternative airports or alternative times or pay the cost, the private at the mere suggestion that perhaps it's more efficient to land and depart a 747 holding 300 folks than a Piper Cherokee (slow on final) holding two, and suggestions that perhaps the Cherokee ought to consider nearby general aviation airports rather than the commercial airport at saturation will meet with howls of protest, no matter how much safer, no matter how much more efficient.
"A 60 seat regional jet takes up as much space in that queue as a 747"
On the ground that's true, but in the air the 747 takes up a lot more space=time due to wake turbulence safety separation requirements.
All that can be worked into the auction pricing, though.
KevinM:
The efficient way to do this is to stack all the heavies into a line so they only have to separate against each other.
The NYC way is to dump you high on slope at some cock-eyed intercept three miles behind a heavy and say "cleared for the visual"
Why doesn't the environmental effect trump everything, at least for Schumer, Clinton, Lautenberg, and Dole?
secret asian man:
Point taken.
'The NYC way is to dump you high on slope at some cock-eyed intercept three miles behind a heavy and say "cleared for the visual"'
Funny thing this wake turbulence. The prep books for the written exam talk about it. Air traffic controllers constantly nag you about it: "Caution, wake turbulence, departing MD-80." But no one ever talks about experiencing it.
I was a student pilot in a Piper Tomahawk, instructor in the right hand seat, just climbing out from a touch-and-go practice landing, and the airplane, for no apparent reason, wanted to roll right. Took full left wheel deflection just to barely keep the wings level. Craziest experience in any airplane. It was as if the controls cables turned to mush. Looked over to my instructor who looked as stupid about all of this as I was.
Wake turbulence, ha! There was no sensation of turbulence. It felt like entering a space warp where a normal trajectory was a helical roll which, fortunately, was (barely) within the control authority of airplane.
So if the controllers have you on a Kamikaze glide slope, they are keeping you above the wing tip vortices of the "heavy."
Question to the crowd: why would ANY small pilot want to land at a major airport?
Where I've traveled, half of the point of flying private or your own plane is to AVOID the major airport thanks to the distance, time, and cost of getting there. This is not so applicable in NYC, but very much the case for London, Toronto, LA...
Is it just for people making connecting flights? I can;t imagine that it's exactly cheap to hangar a small plane at LGA or JFK. Th only airports where I'd understand private pilots mixing with commercial are fairly small and not auctionable places - Aspen, Santa Barbara...
As to what should happen - auction them all, of course, and only sell slots that can be handled on a crappy day. As to overall welfare - after accounting for increased accuracy and fewer bumpings, prices shouldn't increase at all.
Funny thing this wake turbulence. The prep books for the written exam talk about it. Air traffic controllers constantly nag you about it: "Caution, wake turbulence, departing MD-80." But no one ever talks about experiencing it.
Wake turbulence is no joke. I was flying a T-6 in formation and flew into the other aircraft's wake turbulence. I ended up a good distance away and inverted. A good time was had by all.