June 23, 2007
Flying the unfriendly skies
I haven't flown since the Spring of 2001, when I was on the East Coast for a bar mitzvah (and pitching another book to my editor at Scribner's).
A life-long aviation buff, September 11 put me off flying. It's not that I'm afraid to fly; it's that the security is just a joke. I guess the fact that the service stinks and the flying conditions are sub-Greyhound bus quality also add to my general disinclination to fly the friendly skies.
Anyhow, we've booked an Alaskan cruise, which departs from Vancouver -- requiring I put my life in the hands of the TSA.
Oh, happy day.
If it weren't for the fact that Dad is going, too, my nearly six-year plane-free streak would continue. I've told my step-mother that if the jihadists succeed in downing our jet, they'll find my corpse with its hands wrapped around her neck.
Steven Bainbridge, a UCLA law professor, posted his reasons for quitting the United Airlines frequent flier club on his web site, the hard-to-remember ProfessorBainbridge.com.
In the comments are some interesting posts by business travelers -- and a few pilots, too. This one points out that the problems with the industry are attributable in part to us, the bargain-minded public, as well as the ever-so-efficient U.S. Government via the F.A.A.
I am a captain at a major national airline. On one hand, since I don't work for United, I could stand back and enjoy their troubles, but this story could have easily happened to a passenger on my airline, so let me offer my perspective.
First of all, the market rules ... in air travel as in anywhere else. If you look at what air travel cost a passenger 25-30 years ago, and look at what that same leg costs today, you'll see that you're paying far less, in adjusted dollars, than you were then.
If you wonder why you're getting less service today than you were 25-30 years ago, that is part of your answer. To expand on the good Prof's story, this is why there might be only one agent serving a whole lobby of awaiting passengers. If enough people take their business elsewhere, the airlines will respond with the service that our public wants (and I define "wants" as "willing to pay for".)
[...]
The Air Traffic system is congested beyond belief. The FAA has been promising improvements for decades. Some have come through (Reduced Vertical Separation Minimums comes to mind), but many have not. The end result is that we are, on many days, very near total gridlock.
Not that the airlines are entirely lily-white here (we're not), but in many ways, while blaming the airlines may be theraputic, doing so is like blaming your NYC cab driver for the traffic delays in Manhattan. What is really needed is lots more concrete. Tons and tons of it. Communities need to look forward 10, 20, 50 years and project where and how large to grow their airports and begin those plans now. Or, they can fail to plan and accept more of the delays that passengers complain about now.
I simply can't wait to see how out trip compares to the horror stories discussed in Bainbridge's comments.
Sigh.
Posted by Mike Lief at June 23, 2007 10:46 PM
| TrackBack