CAA: GA News, "Election year is perfect timing for new restrictions on park overflights"

["Stephen Irwin" <Stephen.Irwin@pmail.net>]

Friday, April 14, 2000

Election year is perfect timing for new restrictions on park overflights
GA News


WASHINGTON, DC — How does an aviation regulation that doesn’t affect safety
become so important that the president of the United States decides to
release it himself? A cynic might point to political significance in an
election year.

The new rule affecting flights over the Grand Canyon didn’t originate with
the FAA. It arrived with parental fanfare from the Department of
Transportation and the White House. The rule modifies the no-fly zones and
places limits and restrictions on sightseeing operations. The final rule,
which continues as a special federal aviation regulation in FAR Part 91 and
Part 93, becomes law 30 days after its publication in the Federal Register.
(That had not happened when this report was written.)

No-fly zones have been altered, allegedly to give thousands of talking,
laughing and shouting people a quiet atmosphere amid their cars,
recreational vehicles, hotels and souvenir shops.

This idea began in 1988. By 1993, then-Transportation Secretary Federico
Peña and Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt formed an interagency group to
find ways to “reduce the impact” of flights over national parks. Three years
later President Clinton issued an executive memorandum that ordered the
Transportation secretary to issue regulations that would place limits on
sightseeing aircraft. Last July the FAA issued two notices of proposed rule
making that would modify the areas over which aircraft could fly, further
restrict commercial sightseeing flights, and cap the number of air-tour
flights at 1997 levels.

According to Jim Coyne, president of the National Aviation Transportation
Association, many operators will have to cut back on their flights and
cancel any plans they may have had for expanding their businesses.

Coyne called the new rules “disappointing and devastating to a valuable
segment of the aviation industry.” The new rules encompass nearly 100% of
the Grand Canyon area. They expand from 45% to 75% the canyon area that’s
off limits to tour flights and raise the minimum altitude for tour flights
to 17,499 feet.

Though more than five million people visit the park every year, fewer than
20 noise complaints are received annually, Coyne said. He calls it a case of
giving in to a vocal minority at the expense of a great industry.

Commercial operators can get their information from the Las Vegas Flight
Standards District Office. Noncommercial pilots also might want to check the
Las Vegas FSDO before flying over the canyon — just to be on the safe side
of knowing the exact locations of the new no-flight zones, and the routes
and altitudes that may be flown.



CAPITAL HODGEPOGE

* The FAA’s first public forum over the Internet was successful to the point
that future rule-making proposals might also find themselves in cyberspace.
During a recent two-week period, the agency’s Office of Commercial Space
Transportation (CST) solicited views on the growing number of amateur
rocketry enthusiasts.

“This on-line public forum allowed us to reach across a very diverse
population and gain important insight into their concerns and needs,” said
CST Associate Administrator Patricia Grace Smith.

* According to reports from AOPA Australia, that nation is coming out with a
“partial IFR” type of rating that will permit pilots to take off from
airports where conditions are VFR, climb through an overcast and proceed to
a VFR destination. The new reg would add greater utility and flexibility for
pilots.

About 35 years ago, general aviation manufacturers presented a proposal to
the FAA that was very similar. The idea was for a new licensing structure
that would allow pilots to upgrade in increments. The FAA turned it down,
saying the International Civil Aviation Organizations and other nations
wouldn’t accept it.

One has to wonder if the United States will object in ICAO to Australia’s
plan.


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http://www.californiaaviation.org/cgi-bin/dcforum/dcboard.cgi?conf=DCConfID2

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