There's a reason why Seinfeld jokes about "final approach" are so dated. It's because we've made huge gains in ATC over the past two decades
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Airlines don't care about flying faster, flying farther, or flying bigger. They want to fly cheaper. That's all that matters.
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A big part of this is fuel. Back in the day, e.g. when the Air Traffic Controllers went on strike, airplanes carried a lot of extra fuel.
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Fuel = weight, weight = more fuel spent, more costs. The perfect fuel load will be nearly empty when you land.
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But back then, ATC was very manual, and it wasn't uncommon to have to circle in a holding pattern waiting for landing clearance.
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This still happens from time to time, but thanks to modern technology and training, we have improved on this.
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Controllers will know well in-advance when the flights are arriving and can begin landing procedures almost an hour before the plane arrives
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Technologies like ERAM (En-Route Automation Modernization) can predict backups in-advance and deconflict in advance.
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Check out these aircraft flying zig-zag patterns to add a handful of minutes to their flight:https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/29808/why-did-this-plane-fly-in-a-zigzag-pattern/29812 …
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All of this requires intense, standardized coordination across the national airspace, i.e. exactly the thing primed for nationalization.
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Privatization of ATC will make the NAS look more like the National Power Grid. A hopeless mess held together by duct tape and expertise.
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It will cost the airlines money. Which will mean businesses and consumers spend more money and fly less. This is bad for business.
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The mathematics behind air traffic control are some of the most interesting I've ever encountered. This is in the public benefit.
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If you ever want to dive into the intersection of ops engineering, data science, and operations research, ATC is a deep rabbit hole. FIN.
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One last thing. Here you can read about continuous descent tech from NASA: https://www.aviationsystemsdivision.arc.nasa.gov/research/tactical/eda.shtml …
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Much of this technology is developed by private industry with support from NASA and the FAA. Private industry is benefitting already.
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From research firms to the companies building the technology and software, this is an example of working government-corporate relations.
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While there is room for improvement, there is no need to sabotage the progress being made here. It's nonsensical.
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*could* being the operative word. But rarely that works out as planned. Better solution is protecting nationalized infra dollars.
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I don't disagree with your expertise; it mirrors everything I've ever heard from peers. But this is what taxpayer dollars should be used for
End of conversation
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