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American Morning

FAA: Delays To Continue at Airports Throughout Nation

Aired April 25, 2001 - 9:20   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: A new report sheds light on the delays experienced by millions of frequent and frequently frustrated flyers, and it blames airlines which book more flights than airports can handle. CNN's Patty Davis joins us now from Reagan National Airport in Washington with details for us now.

Patty, good morning.

PATTY DAVIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Leon. The FAA for the first time looked at how many flights at the nation's 31 busiest airports, specifically, how many flights all those airports can handle at one time?

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAVIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Morning rush hour at New York's La Guardia Airport. An FAA report, obtained by CNN, the first- ever on how many flights airports can handle, shows La Guardia capable of 80 to 81 flights an hour. But at 8:00 a.m., the major airlines have scheduled 92 flights, leading to unavoidable delays.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The combination of several factors I think have contributed to the worsening of the situation

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Pretty frustrating.

DAVIS: The FAA report finds the same problem, over scheduling, at many of the nation's 31 busiest airports. The worst eight airports in terms of delays: La Guardia, where delays average between 47 to 52 minutes in both good and bad weather -- Newark; New York Kennedy; Chicago O'Hare; San Francisco; Philadelphia; Atlanta; and Boston.

And it's going to get a lot worse, with demand expected to rise 17 percent at La Guardia, 18 percent at Chicago O'hare over the next decade. And Los Angeles International Airport will join the list. Demand there is expected to grow 25 percent.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

DAVIS: For solutions to this delay problem, the FAA doesn't come out with any broad policy prescription; instead, others are calling for more runways to be built. Many say, pour concrete and that will help with capacity at airports. Members of Congress also considering giving the airlines an antitrust exemption. So, they can talk among themselves and come up with a scheduling situation where they can spread out their flights more equally. Also, under consideration, a cap on flights so that there aren't many, many flights taking off more than what the airports can handle -- Leon.

HARRIS: All right, Patty Davis, thanks much.

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