The reliever airport planning and implementation process : a critical review

Abstract

The accommodation of future aviation demand at major air carrier facilities will become increasingly more difficult to achieve. Total aircraft operations are forecast by the FAA to rise by one-third in the 1980's. The resulting capacity and delay problem is of primary concern to the nation. Given the bleak outlook for the construction of new or expansion of existing major air carrier facilities, the securing of additional capacity through the development of reliever airports is of high priority. A reliever airport is broadly defined as a general aviation airport having the primary function of relieving congestion at an air carrier airport by diverting from such airport general aviation traffic. The majority of recent public sector attempts to expand or construct new reliever airports, for example, within Texas have proven unsuccessful. This inability has exasperated the larger air carrier capacity and delay problem nationwide. These problems and potential responses are addressed in this research. This dissertation examines the airport planning and implementation process through a review of public and privately owned reliever airport case studies. These are analyzed in order to identify factors which impede plan implementation and therefore efforts to respond to airport capacity and delay problems. It is the contention of this dissertation that the current airport planning process and its legal and administrative framework impede efforts to successfully implement reliever airport projects and, therefore, require alteration. As will be shown, the problem can be traced to a large measure to legislative failure or administrative reluctance to clearly formulate "public interest" in many instances. The case study findings support the acceptance of this contention. This research demonstrates that public interests, land use, environmental, socio-economic and socio-political factors are currently not adequately addressed. It is contended that without redress of these problems, serious impacts on regional economies are inevitable. Recommendations are presented to make this process implementation oriented and more effective. The existing legal and administrative framework is shown to focus primarily upon the process of planning without adequate emphasis upon implementation. Potentially suitable models and measures to remedy these problems are presented.