ATLANTA -- With a new president in office, warring contingents in the airline industry are again pushing competing visions of how to fix the nation's aging air traffic control infrastructure.
President Donald Trump focused on the issue during a meeting with airline industry CEOs in early February.
"I hear we have the wrong system," Trump said in a discussion about air traffic control modernization. "I hear we're spending billions and billions of dollars. It's a system that's totally out of whack," the president said.
"It's way over budget, it's way beyond schedule, and when it's completed, it's not going to be a good system."
Airline CEOs in favor of spinning off air traffic control from the FAA took that as a sign that Trump may be open to such a transformation.
The debate over how best to upgrade the air traffic control system has pitted airlines against one another.
A privatization effort fizzled last year in Congress, but the issue figures to take on a new shape if Trump's administration takes a position and includes its own proposal as part of a plan for transportation infrastructure.
On one side of the debate is the lobbying group for major carriers, known as Airlines for America. Representing American, United, UPS, Southwest, JetBlue and others, the group is pushing to remove the air traffic control operation in the United States from the FAA and turn it over to a nonprofit entity.
On the other side has been Delta Air Lines, along with consumer groups that call privatization "an unprecedented giveaway to special interests in Washington."
Atlanta-based Delta last year argued that privatization "is a bad idea," saying it would be a distraction that would disrupt momentum and wouldn't fix the problem.
Delta argued during last year's debate that the FAA is making steady progress on its multibillion-dollar air traffic control modernization project, known as NextGen. Former Delta CEO Richard Anderson was chairman of a NextGen advisory committee.
With Delta now led by Anderson's successor, Ed Bastian, the airline has taken a more neutral position.
"Delta remains committed to working with the FAA and other aviation industry stakeholders to make U.S. airspace more efficient, with a goal of reducing delays, improving traffic flows and enhancing airline performance," the company said in a recent news release.
The question of how to fund and structure the air traffic control system is a key issue as the FAA faces another congressional fight over reauthorization, with its spending authority expiring Sept. 30.
The airline lobbying group says privatization would make air traffic control less dependent on Congress for appropriations and less subject to political whims that led to sequestration and a government shutdown in recent years, hindering the FAA from long-term planning for NextGen.
NextGen's main thrust is to shift the system to satellite-based navigation with digital communication, which can allow more direct routing and closer spacing between planes.
Work on NextGen improvements started in 2007 and is expected to continue through around 2030.
"Progress on NextGen has been slow" because it's "trapped in the politics of Washington, D.C.," said Sharon Pinkerton, senior vice president of legislative and regulatory policy. She said $6 billion is sitting in the FAA aviation trust fund "when the system is really in need of modernization."
Trump "obviously has an understanding that the system is woefully outdated, and I think that's a good first step in trying to reach a resolution," Pinkerton said.
The National Air Traffic Controllers Association union last year supported a proposal to spin off air traffic control, saying it would "make safety the top priority," ensure stable funding and protect the controller workforce.
Air traffic controllers union president Paul Rinaldi in a written statement emphasized the importance of a "stable, predictable funding stream" to ensure progress on NextGen continues and "is not undermined."
But consumer groups that formed a coalition called Americans Against Air Traffic Privatization say "the true incentives behind privatizing our nation's ATC system [are] corporate control at the exclusion of workers and taxpayers."
SundayMonday on 03/05/2017