A five point plan to fix the nation's transportation problem
— -- Air travel in this country has become a miserable experience. There is gridlock on the ground and congestion in the skies. Many airports, ill-equipped to handle current passenger volumes and security chaos, are now places to avoid. Our country's airlines are in desperate financial straits. Years of cost-cutting and deferred investment have left most U.S. airlines with a spartan product, inferior in every way to foreign competition. Our passenger rail system lags behind that of almost every other industrialized nation and is virtually nonexistent outside the Northeast corridor.
In spite of this grim reality, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) projects U.S. air passenger volume to increase more than 60% by 2025. If drastic measures aren't implemented to address these problems soon, our entire transportation system will come to a screeching halt long before 2025.
A major overhaul of our nation's air and rail transportation systems is essential to support business travel and tourism over the long term and contribute to a robust economy. A significant investment in our transportation infrastructure now could help generate many of the millions of new jobs we need to reduce unemployment and stave off the effects of the current economic crisis, while building a foundation for future economic growth.
As part of a much-needed national transportation policy, here are five public works projects that would create many thousands of new jobs, bolster business travel and ensure an adequate infrastructure to handle the increased travel demand for the next several decades and beyond.
1. Airport improvements and expansion
Many large airports are already operating at or beyond capacity levels, often creating severe flight delays and frustrated travelers. The FAA's proposed solutions of altering flight patterns, capping flights at congested airports, opening a few new runways and implementing a new GPS-based air traffic control system will at best improve delays marginally and will fall far short of what's required to handle a 60% increase in flights and passengers in the next two decades.
Many airports are constrained geographically or by neighboring residential communities fervently opposed to expansion. For airports not constrained by these limitations, aggressive expansion - including the construction of numerous new runways - is vital to meet our future aviation needs.
Many airports which cannot expand are still long overdue for a major facelift. Most U.S. airports were designed before the advent of regional jets, ultra long range aircraft, expanded international travel, faster aircraft turnaround times, new security regulations, and many other changes of the last few decades. Lobbies, ticket counters, concourses, gates, security areas, aircraft aprons and taxiways, access roads, rental car facilities, and parking lots at many large airports are inadequate to serve today's travelers and must be upgraded and expanded to accommodate the greater passenger demands of tomorrow.
