FAA Threatens Port Authority of New York

Threatened "Slot Blockade" Brings Quick Response

The Associated Press is reporting that the Federal Aviation Administration and the Port Authority of New York are slugging it out. The article, as posted by Mercury.com, says the New York airports are threatening to block some flights.

What would cause a large airport to block flights? Perhaps it is a safety precaution. Perhaps it is in the interest of customer service. No, the Port Authority of New York has threatened to block flights attempting to use "slots" that the FAA auctions off.

What is a slot?

An example of a slot would be the right to operate a single roundtrip flight at Newark Liberty Airport with a five-year lease. In this case the airline (Eos) that owned the slot went bankrupt. What that does is lock in the price as opposed to allowing the airport to adjust prices or delete the trip; it is beneficial to the consumer and not quite so beneficial to the airport, hence the fighting mood.

The Port Authority of New York wants to join the Air Transport Association's lawsuit that says that the FAA has no basis to sell the slots since it hasn't been authorized by Congress.

The overall position of each side lines up this way:

The FAA has warned New York's "big three" airports, Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark Liberty, about "blocking" flights that emanate from their auctioning off of slots. Their punitive action would include pulling eligibility for federal funding in the form of payments and grants. The reason that the Federal Aviation Association feels it has the right to take the airports to task is because the airports have been the recipients of $27 million in federal grant money for improvement programs.

The ATA essentially is trying to block any auction plan. Its position is stated by ATA president and CEO James May in an article on BTNonline where he is quoted as saying: "(this action) is surprising because the end result will be more flights during the busiest time of the day at Newark."

I have been at Kennedy Airport several times even before there were problems with potential and assorted air villains and have never failed to have some form of delay with respect to scheduling.