DOT Announces Flight Caps at JFK and Newark

[Matt Molnar]

After months of discussion, the DOT announced today that it will cap the number of flights allowed to land and depart at JFK and Newark airports for the next two years, after which they may auction additional slots. Effective in March, JFK will be allowed 82 or 83 flights per hour at peak times, contrasting with the 90 to 100 on schedules this past summer. The number at EWR has not yet been finalized. The Port Authority is not pleased.

The DOT also announced the "holiday express lane" — the military airspace off the east coast that was opened to commercial traffic for Thanksgiving — will be open again for the Christmas rush, and they've added a similar chunk of space to benefit west coast travelers as well.

More: http://www.cnn.com/2007/TRAVEL/12/19/ai ... rss_travel

[adam613]

I'm a bit confused about this. Does the cap affect both takeoffs and landings, or just landings? Many of us have personally witnessed over 100 takeoffs and landings at JFK.

Then again, that's in good weather. In bad weather, the delays we eliminate here will shift elsewhere, no?

Finally, how do they decide who gets the slots, if they aren't doing an auction from scratch?

[T-Bird76]

So we go from being 59th in line for take off to 49th in line....Hmmm yep that will solve all the problems. Another stellar job by the FAA, good job boys! :borat:

[Matt Molnar]

I'm a bit confused about this. Does the cap affect both takeoffs and landings, or just landings? Many of us have personally witnessed over 100 takeoffs and landings at JFK.

Yes. The feds say this is not good. PA says NO PROBLEM. Then what IS the problem?

Finally, how do they decide who gets the slots, if they aren't doing an auction from scratch?

I'm guessing a lottery of some sort. I'm guessing jetBlue and Delta in particular will face some major schedule changes.

[bonanzabucks]

Most of the extra capacity during peak hours came from DL and they said they will spread their flights before and after peak times. So, they will be most affected by this.

Personally, I think this is a really dumb idea. Again, like everything else this administration has done, they try to solve a problem by going backwards and not thinking about the future. I don't think delays will be significantly reduced. Most days, even in the summer time, JFK has two peak periods where flights might breach 80 movements -- in the morning at 10:30 and the evening at 6:30. Other than that, you'll get 45-60 movements per hour most of the day, even from 7PM-9PM. Just check out flightaware.com. In the two years I've been visiting that site, and I visit everyday, I've only seen JFK surpass 100 movements maybe three or four times. So, now instead of two peak delay periods, you're going to have 70+ movements per hour throughout the day and delays will be worse overall. It's going to end up just like LGA, which is capped, but has even worse delays. Really dumb.

The media also has it very wrong. They keep saying that JFK is the most delayed airport in the country. EWR and LGA's delay problems are much worse. As of Oct., EWR is the most delayed airport in the nation. JFK is 9th. Even SFO and ATL have worse delays than JFK at this moment.

http://www.avoiddelays.com/

I think they probably should have caped EWR's flights a long time before because that airport has been a problem for as long as I can remember. Two closely-spaced parallel runways doesn't really cut it for lots of operations.

I also wonder where the FAA got the 83 movements per hour cap from. LGA is capped now at 81 and that airport has two small intersecting runways. JFK can use three runways independently, yet the FAA says it can only handle 83 movements? From what I read, they were basing this number on air traffic figures from 2001-2004. Ummm...JFK was virtually empty then because of how 9/11 affected air travel. They only used two runways during that period of time and only started using the present peak configuration late last year. They never even took that into consideration.

Anyways, I think an interesting thing would be how the EU reacts to this. They opened up Heathrow on the basis that they would not be constrained here in the US. The DOT never kept their word. The main EU transportation official threated to cancel open skies if they were restricted in any way to the markets of their choice and it looks like they are. I hope they do cancel the agreement.

Also, I don't think slot auctions will ever materialize. They need to form a law to make it happen and it could take a long time, certainly more than the time the Bush Administration has remaining. Mary Peters will be long gone by then. Besides, Chuck Schumer threatened to delay the hearings to confirm Bush's choice for an FAA chief over auctions and caps. The fun is just about the begin.

And I can't believe the DOT didn't think about it, but why not offer incentives to airlines to fly during less busy hours by making those slots even cheaper? Given the high-cost nature of the industry, airlines would do just about anything to save money. This is a good way to do it and it's a market-based solution.

Finally, with or without flight caps (and I think if they had them, they should have been high 80's to low 90's), we really need to find a way to increase capacity at our airports. ATC improvements will help for sure, but we need another airport or new runways. The PA needs to seriously think of adding new runways to JFK (and they can in Jamaica Bay and east of 22L, where there's lots of room) to ensure long-term growth. I don't think Stewart will cut it. The BAA saw the writing on the wall with LHR and are doing the exact opposite of what the DOT is doing now. The BAA is adding a new runway, but in the meantime, they'll change runway operations to stagger take-offs and landings on both runways, which would increase operations by more than 10%. They were losing out to AMS, FRA and CDG and finally got their act together. The PA and FAA needs to do the same. Start the planning now!

[Mateo]

Dulles runs over 100 ops per hour at peak [1800 hour] with 3 runways going independently (off 1R/30, on 1L). 30 departures go in 1L arrival gaps, but the delays aren't bad at all. The only time IAD gets in trouble is when wx closes down departure fixes, especially SWANN/PALEO (located NE), which is where Europe departures go.

Not only does EWR have just the 2 close runways, but arrivals (almost always on the outer) need to taxi across the departure runway (the inner) to get to the gates.

[bonanzabucks]

IAD had really bad delay problems a few years ago because of Independence Air. After they went out of business, IAD's traffic dropped dramatically and it's only busy three times a day.

Not only does EWR have just the 2 close runways, but arrivals (almost always on the outer) need to taxi across the departure runway (the inner) to get to the gates.

You can say the same about ATL and, even worse, LAX. LAX has hardly any delays, though, because of great weather and heavily reduced traffic since 9/11. Amazingly, they never recovered. It used to be the third busiest airport in the world before 9/11.

[adam613]

Not only does EWR have just the 2 close runways, but arrivals (almost always on the outer) need to taxi across the departure runway (the inner) to get to the gates.

You can say the same about ATL and, even worse, LAX. LAX has hardly any delays, though, because of great weather and heavily reduced traffic since 9/11. Amazingly, they never recovered. It used to be the third busiest airport in the world before 9/11.

LAX and ATL both have two sets of parallel runwys though, so you can conduct simultaneous parallel approaches without slowing down departures. EWR only has one set of parallel runways, and I'm not sure they ever use them both for arrivals or departures at the same time.

(The two times in my life I've flown to LAX, the arrival procedure cracked me up. They'll have a bunch of planes land on 25L and hold on the taxiways between the 25L and 25R, and then when they have a gap in departures, they'll taxi everyone across 25R at the same time. I'm not sure this is so funny, but it is.)

[bonanzabucks]

LAX and ATL both have two sets of parallel runwys though, so you can conduct simultaneous parallel approaches without slowing down departures. EWR only has one set of parallel runways, and I'm not sure they ever use them both for arrivals or departures at the same time.

ATL and LAX arrivals do have to cross the departing runways. It's like EWR, except X2. ATL has twice as many movements as EWR, but it doesn't mean that departures aren't affected. ATL delays are still among the worst in the nation. As for LAX, they just moved a runway so they can add a taxiway (mostly for safety concerns as LAX has the worst incursion rate in the nation). The northern parallels still don't have a taxiway, if I recall.

And no, EWR doesn't use both runways for take-offs and landings. They'll occasionally use the crosswind runway for some take-offs and landings, but not so often throughout the day.

[Mateo]

(The two times in my life I've flown to LAX, the arrival procedure cracked me up. They'll have a bunch of planes land on 25L and hold on the taxiways between the 25L and 25R, and then when they have a gap in departures, they'll taxi everyone across 25R at the same time. I'm not sure this is so funny, but it is.)

Same thing at Newark - everyone gets a separate turnoff from 22L, hold short 22R, and then they all go across at the same time.

I know Indy caused delay problems at IAD in 2005, but I was comparing the IAD situation to the JFK situation today: both capable of 3 runways ops, and both hum along in the 60-75/hour range except for one or two daily peaks over 100. So why is one in crisis mode, and one mostly manageable?