Bush orders Transportation Department to solve airline service problems

President Bush last week stepped into the ongoing debate over declining airline service, ordering Transportation Secretary Mary Peters to come up with some solutions. After a meeting with Peters and acting FAA chief Bobby Sturgell, Bush told reporters that “We’ve got a problem, we understand there’s a problem, and we are going to address the problem.” He cited two specific concerns: Travelers who are subjected to “endless hours sitting in an airplane on a runway,” and overcrowded skies that lead to significant flight delays. “A lot of our air travelers are not only inconvenienced; in some cases, they’re just not being treated fairly,” Bush said. “And there’s a lot of anger amongst our citizens about the fact that they’re not being treated right.” He told Peters to report to him “as quickly as possible” on what can be done to alleviate the problems.

Peters and other officials focused last week on what can be done to resolve problems in the airspace around New York City, where delays are serious at all three airports, especially JFK and Newark. The FAA last week ordered those two airports to provide the government with airline schedule information five months in advance – a move that could be the first step in government-ordered schedule reductions during peak hours, as the FAA has done previously at Chicago O;Hare. DOT said that flight operations at JFK had increased 23 percent from October 2006 to July 2007, and arrival delays of more than 60 minutes there had more than doubled. Nationwide, DOT said, almost 28 percent of all flights so far in 2007 were delayed, cancelled or diverted – the highest level since 2000, when it was 27 percent. During the first seven months of 2007, consumer complaints to DOT were up 65 percent.

Secretary Peters told a press briefing that DOT has called together representatives of the New York-New Jersey Port Authority, the airlines and consumer groups to come up with “market-based mechanisms and other policies that can be used to reduce congestion” in the New York area, with recommendations due b the end of this year. She said the department has also convened a scheduling committee of airlines serving JFK to develop ideas for reducing the number of flights at that congested airport. For example, Peters noted that JFK has the capacity to handle 44 departures between 8-9 a.m., but that current airline schedules include a total of 57 departures listed during that hour. “If necessary, we’re prepared to take the next step and issue a scheduling reduction order” to force the hand of airlines at JFK, Peters said.