FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
2002
2002 - 0057.PDF
FULL LIST OF READER SE & ADVERTISER CONTACTS EDITORIAL +44 (20) 8652 3842 Quadrant House, The Quadrant, Sutton, Surrey SM2 5AS, UK Fax +44 (20) 8652 3840 email flight.intermtional9rbi.co.uk Editor Murdo Morrison •44 (20) 8652 4395 murdo.morrison9rbi.co.uk Editor's PA Debra Warburton •44 (20) 8652 3835 debra.warburton9rbi.co.uk News Editor Andrew Chuter •44 (20) 8652 3843 andy.chuter9rbi.co.uk Deputy News Editor Emma Kelly •44 (20) 8652 3096 emma.kelly9rbi.co.uk Commercial Aviation Editor Max Kinqsley-Jones +44 (20) 8652 3825 max.kingsley.jones9rbi.co.uk Defence Aviation Editor Stewart Penney +44 (20) 8652 3834 stewart.penney9rbi.co.uk Operations/Safety Editor David learmount +44 (20) 8652 3845 david.learmount9rbi.co.uk Business Editor Alexander Campbell +44 (20) 8652 3990 alexander.campbell9rbi.co.uk Business & General Aviation Editor Kate Sarsfield +44 (20) 8652 3885 (maternity leave) Business & General Aviation Reporter Justin Wastnage +44 (20) 8652 i863justin.wastnage9rbi.co.uk Spaceflight Correspondent Tim Furniss +44 (1237) 471960 tim9spaceport.co.uk EUROPE/MIDDLE EAST Israel Correspondent Arie Egozi •972(3)9671155 Middle East Correspondent Gerald Butt •357 2 771967 gbutt9spidernet.com.cy AMERICAS Washington DC Office Fax +1 (703) 836 8344 Americas Editor Graham Warwick +1 (703) 836 3448 graham.warwick9rbi.co.uk East Coast Editor Paul Lewis •1 (703) 836 3084 jpaul.lewis9rbi.co.uk West Coast Editor Guy Norris +1 (949) 252 8971 Fax +1 (949) 252 8972 guy.norris9rbi.co.uk ASIA/PACIFIC Singapore Office Fax +65 338 6171 Regional Managing Editor Nicholas lonides +654343311 Fax+65 338 6171 nicholas.ionides9rbi.co.uk Deputy Asia Editor Andrew Doyle •65 434 3309 andrew.doyleSrbi.co.uk Regional Reporter David Fullbrook +65 434 3314 david.futtbrook9rbi.co.uk Australia Civil Aviation Correspondent Paul Phelan +61 (7) 4053 2791 Fax+61 (7)4053 3003 pdphelan9optusnet.com.au Australia Military Aviation Correspondent Peter La Franchi +61 (0) 419 246 620 Fax +61 (2) 62312795 nulka9ozemail.com.au ADVERTISING UK S Europe +44 (20) 8652 3319 France & Switzerland Tel +33 (1) 53 2188 00 Italy Tel+39 (02) 236 2500 Singapore Tel+65 434 3303 Hong Kong Tel+852 29651542 Australasia Tel +61 (3) 9245 7350 North America Tel +1 (703) 836 7444 Classified & recruitment +44 (20) 8652 3811 SUBSCRIPTIONS +44 (1444) 445454 rbi.subscriptions*rbi.co.uk THE FLIGHT COLLECTION kim.hearn@rbi.co.uk WWW.FLIGHTINTERNATIONAL.COM A^P 1 Air Transport Intelligence (ATI), Flight International's sister j—\J J online service at www.rati.com, contains the full text of Flight •«••• International ant Airline Business since 1996. Full text ot the magazines can also be found online with Lexis-Nexis. Dialogue. FT Profile. IAC and Reuters. Editor Kieran Daly +44 (20) 8652 3837 f^ REED t^S BUSINESS INFORMATION COMMENT Jams tomorrow Don't let the downturn in air travel provide an excuse for slowing down the pace of urgently needed infrastructure reform America's Congressional watchdog the General Accounting Office has warned the country - and the Federal Aviation Administration in particular- not to abandon plans for airport and infrastructure develop ment just because the recession has been worsened by 11 September. When demand returns, the GAO says, the current plan "will fall far short of meeting the system's growing needs". What has prompted the GAO's fears is that the traffic reductions may have downgraded airport congestion among government priori ties. "Delays remain a pervasive problem," says the GAO, classifying airport capacity as "a major national issue". The European Union should listen to what the GAO says because it is just as true on the eastern side of the Atlantic. In fact in both Europe and the USA it is true not only for air ports, but for air traffic control capacity. There Cycles being cycles, it is only time before the upswing begins is no doubt that 11 September pushed the US economic downturn into a full-blown reces sion, but the cyclical downturn was well established before terrorists struck the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon. Now, except for its continued presence in the depressed transatlantic traffic and domes tic US airline figures, the 11 September effect is no longer clear in most of the world. To put it another way, in most parts of the global mar ketplace - even in aviation - it is getting more difficult each month to determine how much of the downturn al-Qaeda could claim to have caused and how much would have happened anyway. Global economic cycles are inevitable,_and for several years financial pages all over the world had been warning that it was only a matter of time before the next recession arrived. Cycles being cycles, it is only a matter of time before the upswing starts again. The manufacturers and the airlines will unques tionably rise to the challenge, but the infrastructure, under severe strain in Europe and the USA before the downturn, will almost certainly fail to do so. The only question is, how serious will the infrastructure shortfall be? Eurocontrol figures make it clear that, a year ago, the still-fragmented European air traffic services (ATS) network was under- capacity. Now, with the year-on-year traffic downturn plus the fact that traffic is at low-sea son levels anyway, Europe's ATS providers are coping. Eurocontrol is well aware that things are not fine and the system cannot rest on its laurels, but the network of state owned air traffic control systems remains subject, as do airports in the USA, to political funding and therefore political priorities. Governments both sides of the Atlantic have an absolutely unbro ken history of ignoring ATS and airport needs until they are in crisis. This industry downturn, then, bodes ill for infrastructure needs. Instead of being used as a useful catch-up period, it is in danger of causing aviation infrastructure improvement to fall off government "to do" lists. If any politicians doubt that aviation will recover and naturally resume its steady growth rate, let them consider this: do they really believe that individual citizens, when the recession is over, will wish to reject their former lifestyle, which included increasingly frequent air travel? Do they really believe that, when business becomes vigorous again, executives and sales teams will not wish to travel to do the deals that, otherwise, their competitors would snatch from them? Do they doubt, as they fail to meet airport and ATS capacity shortages, that their nation's capacity to compete seri ously on the global business stage will be harmed? Do they really believe that foreign investment, overseas companies and tourists will flood into their country when travel to and from it is becoming badly constrained? Not only do people and businesses increas ingly want to travel by air, but in doing so they learn about other countries, their people and their ways of living, thinking and doing busi ness. In his statements summarising the International Civil Aviation Organisation's achievements during 2001, its president, Assad Kotaite, quoted from the preamble to the ICAO's 1945 Convention on International Civil Aviation, which included the lines: "The future development of international civil avia tion can greatly help to create and preserve friendship and understanding among the nations and peoples of the world...to promote that co-operation.. .upon which the peace of the world depends." The passage of 57 years has not altered that truth, so when politicians are tempted to shelve provision for the aviation sector's needs, they harm more than their nation's economy. SEE AIR TRANSPORT P7 www.fliqhtinternational.com FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 8-14 JANUARY 2002 3
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
