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Ending 'holding pattern,' FAA cancels plan to close towers
Washington (CNN) -- After several weeks of indecision, the Obama administration has decided against closing 149 contractor-run air traffic control towers due to sweeping budget cuts. The decision by the Transportation Department brought a "sigh of relief" from small- and medium-sized airports nationwide that would have been impacted by the closures. Those towers employ some 900 controllers and the airports employ a range of other workers. (www.cnn.com) Más...Sort type: [Top] [Newest]
This demonstrates the need for Congress to privatize the ATC functions of the FAA leaving the bureaucrats of the FAA oversight and regulatory duties. There will be more "budget" crises and if Congress funds the contract it will be immune from political tantrums as government is actually reined in to provide Constitution functions. NavCanada is an example of this working.
Agreed, the official stance really should be "If you want it, you pay for it"
Exactly, the airports should pay for it. If the airport is busy enough to justify keeping the controllers, they should have the money to pay them, not getting Uncle Sam to pay them. However, if they're like some of these airfields that only have a handful of movements per day, then they shouldn't have been in the first place!
Well, if all our user taxes and fees went to the right fund instead of the general fund and paying for non aviation related things, there might be enough to support them. A good example is the highway trust fund. We can't upgrade highway infrastructure because they don't have the money. The reason they don't have the money is that they are subsidizing mass transit. There probably are a bunch of low use towers that could go away or be airport funded but cuts would be better done by using a little common sense and good numbers rather than a meat ax approach as they did.
"[I]f Congress funds the contract" then we taxpayers will still be paying. Where do you think Congress gets money from?
Big business...
Congresspersons get campaign money from "big business." The money they use to fund programs comes from taxpayers (including businesses).
gottya thanks for advice..