This week, the battle of the skies begins again. The House committee on Transportation and Infrastructure is scheduled to start work on re-authorizing a budget for the Federal Aviation Administration, and lobbyists for industry and consumers are lining up to try to get their favorite issue into the bill.
Consumer issues include requirements that when a family books together they be seated together, an end to—or at least limits on—change fees, baggage fees and seemingly random surcharges, and possibly even minimum standards for passenger space. While it's unlikely that Congress will set a foot-room standard, advocates are asking that the FAA be mandated to study the question as a health and safety issue.
The airlines, and their lobbyists, including Airlines for America, have two main issues. First, they want the FAA to move ahead on modernization of the air traffic control system, and to place it in the hands of a government-chartered agency that would be controlled by its stakeholders...you guessed it, the airlines. They strongly oppose privatization, though.
Their other big issue is what might be called the "right to lie." They are pushing what two years ago they called the "transparent airfare act," which would allow the airlines to quote a low-ball fare, and only at the last moment tell you what else you have to pay to get the ticket, both airline fees and government taxes. They call it transparent on the theory that otherwise you wouldn't know how much tax you were paying.
For details on the various proposals and the groups supporting them, see Chris Elliott's piece in today's Washington Post travel section. Click HERE
Photo: Chicago O'Hare concourse H (Matt Popovich / Wikimedia)
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