SPECIAL REPORT: IT GENERAL AVIATION
Little and large
Oliver Clark takes a closer look at the different strategies being adopted by US airports for handling general aviation traffic.
F
or many of the US’s busiest airports, the pressure to allocate scarce runway slots to the ever growing number of aircraft using their facilities leaves them with little room, or desire, to handle ‘other’ types of aviation.
Scheduled airline services, after all, are the revenue earning bread
and butter operations of most airports while general aviation (GA) is often viewed as a hindrance to the gateway’s core business. And with general aviation (GA) aircraft ranging in size from tiny
two-seater Cessna training aircraft to single aisle corporate jets, and potentially sharing the airfield with B747s, it is easy to see why some consider GA to be a ‘sideshow’ to the main event. However, the big US airport operators do appear to be more
sympathetic to GA traffic than their counterparts in Europe and other parts of the world, and as a result many have developed their own business strategies for dealing with the phenomenon. “I can guarantee that if you talked to London Heathrow about their
thoughts on general aviation, they would say it is a pain in the neck, because it isn’t set up for that kind of operation,” says Colin Smith, regional director for Europe, Middle East, South Asia and Africa operations with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (PANYNJ). “Small propeller and jet aircraft are a problem for hub airports,
there is quite simply no getting away from it.” So with the New York area’s five airports (JFK, Newark Liberty,
LaGuardia, Stewart and Teterboro) handling some 106 million passengers per year between them and the airspace above the Big Apple being among the most congested in the world, it would be easy to assume the port authority would take a dim view of general aviation. It would be a wrong assumption, however, as the PANYNJ is well
aware of the social and economic benefits of a sector that contributes $150 billion to the US economy annually, employs more than 1.2 million people, and transports another 166 million around the globe, according to the General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA). PANYNJ’s answer to the problem of congestion has been to channel
GA traffic through its specialist ‘hub’ of Teterboro Airport. “Anyone who has been to New York understands how congested our
airports can be and we needed a way to accommodate the demand from general aviation,” says Ralph Tragale, assistant director of aviation and public affairs at PANYNJ. While the likes of Donald Trump and New York Mayor, Michael Bloomberg, may prefer to fly into LaGuardia International Airport, GA
66 AIRPORT WORLD/OCTOBER-NOVEMBER 2010
traffic is encouraged to use Teterboro, through low user charges, no slot limitations, lounge space and ground handling services provided by five Fixed Base Operators (FBO), not to mention its location just 12 miles from downtown Manhattan. “I see it as an important part of our business, the port
authority needs general aviation, which is why we have made Teterboro the premier general aviation airport in the USA,” enthuses Tragale. “Obviously we would like to direct all GA traffic to Teterboro, but
this is not always possible, so officially we are happy to accommodate it at our other airports, but it is better served there.” Just five miles from the Lincoln Tunnel, a major road link
connecting New Jersey with Manhattan Island, Teterboro was the natural choice for a GA gateway, says Tragale, as it offers
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