cfiaime@ihnp4.UUCP (Jeff Williams) (09/20/84)
As was mentioned in an earlier article, the airlines are running scared about scheduling flights at six busy airports. According to the September 17 issue of "Aviation Week," Robert L. Crandall, American Airlines president and chief operating officer, is also calling for a cut of GENERAL AVIATION flights at busy airports. According to the article on page 28, in one instance the air carriers had scheduled 46 departures from Atlanta in one 15 minute period when the airport could only handle 17 departures on an average day. People Express and other carriers planning for expansion of winter schedules at Newark had expected operations to exceed 100 per hour. And, in a related story, People Express is now planning 747 service from Newark to San Francisco, with fares comparable to the $119/$149 Newark-Los Angeles fares. People Express is also considering NEW service to Denver, New Orleans, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, Dallas, St. Louis, and cities in the Carolinas and Tennessee. No wonder there are scheduling and capacity problems. So, why am I concerned? Consider the analogy of the interstate hiway system. What if Continental Trailways and Greyhound complained about all of the cars on the interstates and wanted to ban travel by private auto to major cities? We who fly have that problem happening again. Jeff Williams AT&T Bell Laboratories ihnp4!cfiaime