Frank
Joined: 10 Jan 2006 Posts: 69
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Posted: Fri Feb 17, 2006 2:59 pm Post subject: YAK user fees |
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Just to change the subject.....
Got an email-gram from AOPA detailing examples of just why they have opposed air traffic and airport landing user fees here in the US. They relate the Canadian experiences and why it would be bad policy here in the US (see below).
If they were to try and impose that on US citizens I can tell you it wouldn't be long before these air traffic controllers would be out of business. For example, the technology exists today to do away with the need for ANY air traffic control system. With the level of technology we have today it is eventually going to happen anyways.
We have the capability to build navigation and guidance systems that have no need for ground based control....Highways-In-The-Sky if you will. The technology for it exists now............all we need is some impetus for us to adopt it. User fees would do just that. Who was it that posted about "Unintended Consequences"? Here's the perfect example.......Air traffic controllers get privatized, they get too greedy and next thing you know we don't need them anymore because technology displaced them. It can happen........eventually it will, I think.
Frank
USER FEES FAR FROM SUCCESSFUL IN CANADA
The most vocal user fee proponents usually point north to Nav Canada to
demonstrate the "success" of the concept. Yet since the commercialization
of air traffic control in Canada and the imposition of direct fees for
ATC services, the system has struggled financially. Now Nav Canada wants
to impose new user fees on general aviation to try to make up for the
shortfall. AOPA, on behalf of U.S. citizens flying in Canada, is objecting.
"This proposal underscores why AOPA opposes a user fee-based system in the
United States," said Andy Cebula, AOPA executive vice president of government
affairs. "It illustrates why a user fee system does not provide stable
funding and reinforces AOPA's stance that Congress (or Parliament in the
case of Canada) is the appropriate 'board of directors' for a national air
transportation system." Nav Canada wants to start collecting new "daily
charges" from aircraft weighing less than three metric tons (less than
6,075 pounds) using eight major Canadian airports. The charge would start
at $5 a day and escalate to $10 a day by 2008. "The U.S. national air
transportation system is well served by the stable funding stream provided
by the existing combination of taxes and general fund contributions," said
Cebula. "We find no reason to support a different funding system in a foreign
country, and we encourage Nav Canada to reconsider the proposal and not
implement the proposed new fees." See AOPA Online
( http://www.aopa.org/whatsnew/newsitems/2006/060213navcanada.html ).
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