Doug,
I would ask the same of airlines, FAA, airline investors, Congress, and
the air traveling public.
Fault goes to all parties!
Fault airlines for not invoking self-help, system-optimizing their own
day-of-flight trajectories to eliminate the root cause drivers of the
need for ATC to intervene, vector, reroute, and delay. Airlines could
eliminate random point overloads in the NAS and sequence and time their
own flight trajectories such that ATC workload is reduced, and airlines'
reliability and on-time performance are improved, while reducing pads, a
virtuous cycle of improvement in operating margins, and of capital and
labor utilization.
Fault FAA for thinking that 'resetting' airlines' optimally designed
flight schedules 'in advance' and 'in 3D' prevents the continuous growth
of day-of-flight of real-time, random variations in flight trajectories,
leading to 4D point-overload congestion, gate to gate.
These are fundamental refusals and misunderstandings of the issues
driving ATC infrastructure, procedures and workload, about which
airlines complain bitterly, that not only ensure the status quo, but
will cause $30+ billion in BNATCS investment, despite a lack of stated
performance metrics, and no objectives for 'improvement', to be the
latest over budget, under-performing, and late failure to market.
Fault key investors and particularly the buy/sell-side industry analysts
for failure to push airlines, letting this margin-depressing behavior go
on for decades.
Fault Congress for holding everyone else hostage, for forcing taxpayers
to spend $30+ billion when $30 million of commercially available
software has already solved these problems including the ability for
airlines to system-optimize day-of-flight trajectories to the airline's
own business rules and objectives.
Congress should not squander a '1000x' savings, especially when a more
cost-effective, proven, working system can be delivered across the NAS
years sooner.
Not to mention, the commercially available system has been deployed
globally, and independently validated to deliver on-time, capital and
labor efficiency and operating cost benefits, including by FAA who
funded its demonstration of honest brokerage of multi-carrier
system-optima to a global optimum, while it promotes BNATCS, a hideously
expensive, poorly thought out plan to fail.
Fault the air traveling public for putting up with this for so long,
wasting their precious time and productivity. Why pay-up for air travel
utility when it is allowed to be so inherently unreliable by design?
I will take demonstrated cost-effective NOWGEN over hopium NEVERGEN, any
day of the week.
Meanwhile, hurry up and wait.
- Bob Mann
On 5/28/2026 8:45 AM, Doug Church via Mifnet wrote:
RE: "airlines/users/pilots *should* be saying ..."
But they're not. They have not. They are not. When will they, Michael?
Today? Next week? 2028? Ever?
As Ted Knight's character in /Caddyshack/, Judge Smails, famously
said: "Well? ... We're waiting."
How long, Michael, are you prepared to wait for your desired plan to
come together with all the airlines and users coming forward to take
control of the ATC system as you've outlined so many times?
Meanwhile ... the current outdated system and airspace that is neither
efficient, nor optimized, continues to languish and stagnate and cause
the delay problems that you are rightly speaking out against.
How about we STOP waiting for the system to improve? How about we act
NOW? No more waiting. What a concept.
What I see is a POTUS, DOT Secretary, and FAA Administrator taking the
lead and actually DOING something ... FINALLY ... to lead and act to
modernize the ATC system. They have support from Congress and every
corner of the aviation community. The Modern Skies Coalition is
evidence of this. Check out the list of entities that are part of the
coalition all calling for modernization. Rapid, comprehensive
modernization. NOW. https://modernskies.com/who-we-are/
As always, I respect you, Michael, tremendously, for the excellent
career you have had as a pilot (in my favorite aircraft, the 747) and
aviation expert. I continue to ask you to keep an open mind on the
only current, viable path forward for true NAS modernization that
currently exists and which actually has momentum instead of waiting
for the airlines to do what you keep asking them and urging them to do.
-Doug Church
On Wed, May 27, 2026 at 9:51 PM ATHGroup--- via Mifnet
<[email protected]> wrote:
FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford’s comments on May 21, 2026, and
January 22, 2026, highlighted a concerning trend in air traffic
management.
On January 22nd Mr. Bedford stated
<https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/air-transport/2026-01-22/faas-bedford-provides-view-future-atc>,
“/We’ll tell you where we want you to be in three dimensions…and
we’ll tell you where we want you to be to hit that top of descent
mark to meet the constraints of the runway/”.
FAA's "/ATC must be in control/" mantra is also reflected in
Bedford's recent proclamation in Karen Walker’s May 21, 2026,
Aviation Week article
<https://aviationweek.com/air-transport/safety-ops-regulation/faa-chief-airlines-must-reset-schedules-support-atm>,
where FAA is ordering airlines to reset their schedules to
accommodate ATM modernization.
However, FAA’s narrative is backwards and must be reversed.
Instead of “/FAA Chief Orders Airlines to Reset Schedules for ATM
Modernization/” airlines/users/pilots should be saying
“/Airlines/Users directs FAA Chief to reset ATM modernization to
accommodate airline/user schedules, while ATC ensures safe
separation throughout the airspace/”. While requiring
airlines/users to step up, this independently validated
airline/user centric solution is a much easier, more profitable,
less expensive and safer path forward.
Therefore, it is crucial for aviation to rapidly move to a joint
airline/user/pilot/controller/ATC solution that dynamically
incorporates the “/day of/” business needs of each of the
airline’s/user’s aircraft (which will change daily, and sometimes
hourly) where airlines/users and pilots manage aircraft flows and
ATC provides separation, which greatly simplifies the solution.
With 50 years of experience in airline operations and ATC, I
believe this “/shovel ready/” solution, while not the mainstream,
is the only viable way to a future airline industry that
profitably puts the passenger where promised, when promised.
Conversely, trying to build a future aviation system based on the
decades old “/ATC only/” control processes using updated Ground
Delay Program or Cooperative Decision Making tools, which forces
controllers to increase their workload (separate plus manage the
aircraft speed) and ignores airline and pilot capabilities will
not succeed.
Finally, regarding the FAA’s Brand New ATC System (BNATCS) and its
Strategic Management of Airspace Routing Trajectories tool
(SMART), consider the following:
1. FAA’s role, as outlined in the Federal Aviation Regulations
and the Air Traffic Controller Handbook (7110.65BB), is to
provide separation and safety, not to manage aircraft. As
stated, “/SMART is not aimed at separating aircraft or doing
any of those kind of safety-critical functions/”, which is
exactly ATC's job.
2. SMART appears to be a digitized version of the 1980s Ground
Delay Program (GDP), which has proven ineffective and does not
account for the variance created after the aircraft departs
the gate (+/- 20 minutes).
3. The data required for SMART to efficiently “/predict air
traffic flows and adjust departure times to resolve
conflicts/” days in advance will not be close to accurate
enough for many years into the future. Besides, why would
anyone want the government to do this?
4. SMART fails to dynamically incorporate the airline’s tactical,
“/day of/” business needs (schedule, connections, gate
availability, crew legality, fuel on board, airport capacity,
ramp, maintenance, galleys, lavs, etc.) or the pilot’s ability
to manage enroute speed and arrival time.
5. BNATCS is built on the outdated belief that airport/airspace
capacity is the problem. It is not
<https://greenlandings.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/05/AGIFORS-Random-Point-Overloads-White-Paper-2026-04-14.pdf>.
6. *FAA wants to spend $10s of billions controlling aircraft
flows when airlines can safely manage their own aircraft flows
for $10s of millions.*
Michael
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
R. Michael Baiada
cell - (303) 521-6047
[email protected]
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