With more airlines grounding planes because of fuel costs, there should be fewer planes and less delays, right?
Wrong.
The Federal Aviation Administration cautions that air traffic lanes will continue to be full in air space that is normally crowded.
The reason is that the airlines will contract their flying schedules in less-busy cities, which never had much congestion to begin with. Landing slots at busy airports will, for the most part, continue to be fully used, say Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) officials.
“We’re going to see the concentration of large operators at the large airports,†said Michael J. Sammartino, director of system operations at the FAA’s Strategic Command Center in Herndon, Va.
Even so, the agency plans a variety of new steps to reduce delays, relying on new technologies and procedures.
Traffic at the top 35 airports was up 1.5 percent from October through April, compared with the same period a year earlier.
The cuts will not be permanent, some industry experts say. “The reduction in service domestically is a short-term phenomenon,†said Aaron J. Gellman, a professor of management and strategy at Northwestern University’s Transportation Center.
