FAA BS: TTFs DO NOT threaten airports expansion...

Well, one of my friendly aviation associates sent me links to testimony the FAA delivered today; the agency staffers testified before House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

First up for your consideration, Catherine Lang, the FAA's associate administrator for airports. She told the hearing, according to press accounts, "The fundamental distinctions between public use airports ... and private airports have begun to blur."

Our friends over at the National Air Transportation Association sent me a press release declaring their concurrence. NATA's president James Coyne, generally a sharp guy and an active GA pilot, told the members this: “NATA agrees with the FAA that the primary issue for not allowing new RTTF agreements is to ensure the future utility of federally funded airports. Investments in airports, made through the Airport Improvement Program or through federal surplus property grants, are intended to enhance the flexibility of airports to meet the future needs, in both capacity and type of operations, of the National Airspace System. Due to the intrinsic nature of residential properties, as compared to commercial properties, RTTF agreements limit the flexibility of airport sponsors to expand according to the needs of the community. NATA believes that the FAA has made an overwhelming case for prohibiting new RTTF agreements and supports its proposal.”

Well...is that it? This stuff isn't going to be the last word. While I haven't heard what EAA or AOPA testified, lacking their perspectives, let me share a bit of my own take: "Bunk!"

Sorry, Jim; Sorry Ms. Lang; your assertions are patently "Bunk!" -- which sounds so much more polite than my first instinct. Bovine effluent.

No one, not the FAA, not NATA, offers any compelling evidence to support the contention that "RTTF agreements limit the flexibility of airport sponsors to expand according to the needs of the community."

To ask politely, what are you people smoking? A residential neighborhood of aviation fans and airport supporters is "intrinsically"more difficult to dislodge than, say, a higher-density residential area with no fans of aviation. Or an industrial park? Or small shop with a deep-pocket owner?

Really...On what planet?

And just so Jim knows I'm not solely picking on his comments, Ms. Lang failed to explain in any meaningful way how well-reasoned, balanced residential TTF neighborhoods "blur the lines between public use...and private airports" more so or even differently than the thousands of TTF agreements publicly owner airports have with business neighbors?

Are you saying public-private lines aren't blurred when it's a business selling whatever -- but are when it's Joe Pilot coming home from the office? OK...How? Take your time -- we know how long it takes an agency to think up answers to fit the policy...

At the end of the day, a publicly owned airport faces the same obstacles and obstructions whether the neighbors are private businesses or private residences.

Let's go a little further here. How can airport with a RTTF and a vibrant residential neighbor and ally somehow going to find it more difficult to deal with the neighbors when discussing airport expansion than one filled with people -- many of whom believe their move into the area justifies asking the airport to shut down altogether?

Sorry, Ms. Lang, sorry Mr. Administrator Babbitt, sorry Mr. Coyne. Nothing heard in that hearing approaches justification for preventing case-by-case consideration of new RTTF agreements with public, federally funded airports.

You all know damned well that not every publicly owned airport is a candidate for the kind of growth you think an RTFF would handicap; the majority won't. You also well know -- or should -- how difficult survival is for even financially viable publicly owned airports, and how much closer pressures exist for many airports.

Yet somehow you think providing business with privileges you'd withhold from individual citizens is somehow a path to airport utopia?

On what planet?

And we're bound to hear back about the "national security" issue somewhere in this; yes, individuals at some airports have had some issues -- some of them at RTTF sites, some of them at BTTF locales (as in "Business Through The Fence"). So what? Either we have a public airports system or we don't.

Security issues should be resolved at the site of the offense; not by stopping through-the-fence.

So a couple of suggestions:

First, come up with at least a mythological scenario where all the power of imminent domain and taxing authority of a community would fail a RTFF airport should it want to expand -- and how that would have been different had it been businesses instead of residences. We no longer tolerate claims lacking any backing; this is one of those.

Second, explain to the rest of us how private business is inherently a more-desirable TTF neighbor than an individual with a home -- right now, you've got nothing on this front but a baseless contention; for instructions on resolving that problem, see the next paragraph up.

Third, if you actually can come up with some fiction to support that second point, bring along an explanation of why business warrants or deserves any preferential access over a private individual seeking access in any public-private encounter . And telling us "they create jobs" won't cut it; those home create jobs, too. They pay taxes -- they are the citizens the Founders had in mind when they drafted our Constitution; don't remember seeing anything mentioning corporations, businesses, etc.

Time to punt, folks.

The FAA's conclusion here is unfathomable, unjustifiable and unneeded. It's chasing a problem that exists only in their minds. And it's wholly incompatible with part of the agency's mission.

As my friend there put it, "So much for FAA promoting aviation...again."

Respectfully,

Dave