FAA to airlines: Improve scheduling or feds will

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- If airlines don't improve on record flight delays, the federal government will impose its own solutions, the outgoing Federal Aviation Administration administrator warned Tuesday.

"Passengers are growing weary of schedules that aren't worth the electrons they're printed on," Marion C. Blakey told a group of aviation executives at the Aero Club.

"Airline schedules have got to stop being the fodder for late-night monologues. And if the airlines don't address this voluntarily, don't be surprised when the government steps in."

A spokesman for the Air Transport Association, which represents commercial airlines, said the trade group is willing to talk about ways to reduce congestion -- to a point.

"No carrier is going to be willing to reduce its schedule unless we see that industry addresses all of the causes of delay," David Castelveter said.

Through July of this year, the airline industry had its worst on-time performance since the government began tracking such data in 1995, according to The Associated Press.

About 70 percent of U.S. flights arrived on time in July, the AP reported, citing Department of Transportation figures.

Blakey, whose five-year term ends Thursday, cited airspace over the East Coast as among the most congested.

She called for airlines and the government to make the transition from 1960s radar-based air traffic control systems to satellite-based technology, "a solution that will cut delays by 20 percent and reduces noise for 600,000 people."

She added that corporate aviators should also be prepared to chip in.

"Flying to and from wherever you want whenever you want is not a free utility," she said. "You need to expect to pay for it."

The Air Transport Association's Castelveter also focused on corporate aviation.

"The guys who fly around in private jets" make up about 40 percent of the air traffic in the Northeast, he said. "One would think it's not just airlines that would be asked to reduce capacity," he said.

He blamed resistance from environmentalists for the government's failure to move more quickly toward a satellite-based technology that's been 10 years in the making.

"Residents that have homes that would be in that flight path are saying no," Castelveter said.

Antitrust rules keep airlines from discussing their scheduling issues with one another, he said, and called for the government to give antitrust immunity to the industry so they can "talk about how best to schedule flights."

In 1970, when Congress established the Airport and Airway Trust Fund, there were 2,500 commercial airplanes and 1,800 corporate jets in the United States, Castelveter said.

At the end of last year, 8,000 commercial airplanes and 18,000 corporate planes were operating 40,000 to 50,000 flights per day in U.S. airspace.

Such numbers can overwhelm air traffic controllers even on clear days.

When bad weather becomes a factor, it is "like pouring glue on the air traffic-control system," Castelveter said.

But the cost of moving to the more sophisticated technology is daunting: $15 billion for commercial airlines to equip their planes with new equipment and an additional $15 billion to $22 billion for the FAA to adopt the satellite technology, he said.

A spokesman for the National Business Aviation Association, which represents corporate planes, did not immediately return a call seeking comment. E-mail to a friend

Copyright 2007 CNN. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report.

All About Federal Aviation Administration • Marion C. Blakey