Julian Moxon/HANOVER
THE EUROPEAN Regional Airlines Association (ERA) is complaining bitterly about the "outrageous" air-traffic-control (ATC) charges being imposed on its members.
At its annual general meeting in Hanover, Germany, earlier in October, ERA director-general Mike Ambrose said that landing and navigation charges account for up to 20% of the overall operating costs of European regional airlines.
"When you add ground-handling and fuel, that quickly becomes 50%," he says. Such costs are "totally outside the control of the airline," he adds.
Tyrolean Airlines president Fritx Freitl says that it is "outrageous" that there is still no cost control over ATC charges at a time when the airline industry had been forced to lower costs and fares. "Their salaries are incredibly high," he says in a clear reference to the tax-free salaries earned by some in the industry. "We realise that ATC cannot be privatised, and that therefore it must remain a monopoly-but there should be more stringent controls," he says.
Regional carriers are also worried about the costs of installing new equipment to meet Joint Aviation Authorities' JAR OPS 1 requirements and those resulting from the need to increase ATC capacity in Europe. Ambrose puts the average cost of equipping a regional jet at between $350,000 and $500,000, not including installation and downtime costs. "It's a non-negotiable investment that has no return for us other than an eventual increase in productivity," he says.
Area navigation equipment, 8.33kHz radios, Mode S transponders, multi-mode receivers and TCAS 2 collision-avoidance sets would be among the items of equipment required by the year 2000, according to Ambrose.
"Three years later, we'll also have to equip to meet the new reduced vertical-separation minima", he adds.
Source: Flight International
