throttlejockey
A serious CRM problem!
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2001
- Posts
- 143
Score: Arrogant Pilot Association 1 - Rural Communites without Air Service 0.
Group Still Optimistic on Air Service
BY SARA LINDAU: Staff Writer
Despite setbacks in the once-promising deal with Corporate Airlines to provide passenger service to Moore County, airport officials remain optimistic that a regional carrier will be recruited.
Moore County and five other airports formed a consortium in effort to get the Tennessee-based carrier to provide roundtrip flights out of Raleigh-Durham International Airport. The consortium received a federal grant to help the airline with some of its start-up costs. That grant is good through next year.
The consortium remains united in its goal to attract a regional service, regardless of whether it is Corporate or another airline, according to a state aviation official.
It is appears unlikely that it will be Corporate Airlines.
But Harold Garner, chairman of the Moore County Airport Authority, still prefers to say there’s an “impasse” that no one is certain “will break” for Corporate’s efforts to obtain a waiver from American Airlines’ pilots union to allow nonunion pilots to fly the smaller Corporate planes into RDU. At one time, the waiver appeared to be the last remaining obstacle to overcome.
Six months later with no progress on the waiver in sight, some coalition members are “independently talking with air carriers to try and obtain service for their separate communities,” according to an April 15 letter from William Williams, chief of the Aviation Division in the N.C. Department of Transportation.
Williams also wrote that Peter Bowler, president of American Eagle Airlines, indicated the “waiver required to allow Corporate Airlines to operate American Connection Services at RDU will not be forthcoming.”
In a letter dated April 5, responding to a Feb. 18 letter from NCDOT Secretary of Transportation Lyndo Tippett, Bowler said, “Corporate is prohibited from operating American Connection flights between RDU and the communities that desire the service.”
Bowler wrote that “American will not be able to allow Corporate’s AmericanConnection service,” but that airline remains “committed to finding ways to grow air service to the state.” He said American Airlines is restricted from allowing Corporate to begin American Connection service at RDU based on collective bargaining agreements with the Allied Pilots’ Association that prohibit regional carriers not owned by American from operating the service on routes that do not touch an American hub airport on one end. RDU is not defined as an American hub in the agreement, he wrote.
American Airlines and the unions are “continuously engaged in constructive dialogue…covering a wide variety of issues,” Bowler wrote. The dialogue has not so far produced the waiver. Tippet’s office received the letter April 13.
“The need for improved or re-established scheduled air service at the six coalition communities is as important today as when the grant proposal was submitted this past June 2003,” Williams wrote to Teresa Bingham, an aviation analysis associate director for the U.S. Department of Transportation. “In light of this latest communiqué from American Eagle, we have redoubled our efforts to find suitable partners to provide this essential connection to the nation’s air transportation network for the coalition.”
Williams expressed gratitude to the federal agency’s “trust and patience. We ask that your support to the coalition continue as we endeavor to overcome these unfortunate and uncontrollable setbacks.”
Caleb Miles, CEO and President of the Convention and Visitors Bureau in Moore County, is a member of a task force working to recruit a passenger airline service to Moore County.
He said Tuesday that he and other task force members are continuing to discuss options and plan to regroup after losing a second key member in less than a year.
Michael Shouse, executive director of the Moore County Airport Authority, is resigning effective May 31. Longtime airport supporter and authority member J.T. Cotner died a few months ago. Both were members of the air service task force.
“The task force is still in place,” Miles said Tuesday in a telephone interview. “We plan to operate in a similar way as before. This is a challenging time of the year, with the (tourism) season.
“Other options are being looked at. The grant (a $1.2 million federal grant for the six-community consortium to restore or enhance diminished service) is still there, and that’s a big plus.”
Miles said Shouse “did some very good things for the community and the task force. You could tell he was passionate about restoring service.”
He also said Shouse, as the staff person working for the airport authority, did a lot of coordination and legwork on behalf of the task force, whose other members are volunteers or represent other agencies not dealing directly with Federal Aviation Administration and state Aviation Division officials and regulations.
Miles said he heard some say the Corporate Airlines deal is still possible.
Corporate Airlines CEO Doug-las Caldwell was quoted by a participant in an April 7 meeting in Raleigh as saying he “feels it may not be totally out of the question.”
The remaining members of the local task force appointed by the Authority are Miles, Peter Stilwell, marketing director of Pinehurst Resort, Assistant County Manager Mike Griffin and Bob Hawkins, a retired airline executive.
The task force was formed in 2002 to try to restore commercial passenger airline after US Airways Express ended roundtrip service out of Charlotte Douglas International Airport. The airline terminated the service in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the continuing financial struggles facing the airline industry.
The task force first tried to work out something with US Airways before turning to Corporate, a Smyrna, Tenn.-based regional carrier that flies connector flights for American Airlines in the Midwest and Northeast.
The carrier had operated a regional service for a time out of New Bern and Kinston, two of the members of the consortium.
The others in consortium are Fayetteville, Wilmington and Hickory. All have been meeting every month with the N.C. Department of Transportation aviation division officials.
The once-imminent deal with Corporate helped attract a $1.2 million federal grant.
Garner told The Pilot earlier he might attend the next planned meeting of the consortium on Thursday in Raleigh.
Williams told The Pilot in a Monday telephone interview that he expected the consortium would discuss other options to Corporate Airlines but he could not detail what they may be.
He said the discussion would be more advanced that just a “brainstorming” session.
Group Still Optimistic on Air Service
BY SARA LINDAU: Staff Writer
Despite setbacks in the once-promising deal with Corporate Airlines to provide passenger service to Moore County, airport officials remain optimistic that a regional carrier will be recruited.
Moore County and five other airports formed a consortium in effort to get the Tennessee-based carrier to provide roundtrip flights out of Raleigh-Durham International Airport. The consortium received a federal grant to help the airline with some of its start-up costs. That grant is good through next year.
The consortium remains united in its goal to attract a regional service, regardless of whether it is Corporate or another airline, according to a state aviation official.
It is appears unlikely that it will be Corporate Airlines.
But Harold Garner, chairman of the Moore County Airport Authority, still prefers to say there’s an “impasse” that no one is certain “will break” for Corporate’s efforts to obtain a waiver from American Airlines’ pilots union to allow nonunion pilots to fly the smaller Corporate planes into RDU. At one time, the waiver appeared to be the last remaining obstacle to overcome.
Six months later with no progress on the waiver in sight, some coalition members are “independently talking with air carriers to try and obtain service for their separate communities,” according to an April 15 letter from William Williams, chief of the Aviation Division in the N.C. Department of Transportation.
Williams also wrote that Peter Bowler, president of American Eagle Airlines, indicated the “waiver required to allow Corporate Airlines to operate American Connection Services at RDU will not be forthcoming.”
In a letter dated April 5, responding to a Feb. 18 letter from NCDOT Secretary of Transportation Lyndo Tippett, Bowler said, “Corporate is prohibited from operating American Connection flights between RDU and the communities that desire the service.”
Bowler wrote that “American will not be able to allow Corporate’s AmericanConnection service,” but that airline remains “committed to finding ways to grow air service to the state.” He said American Airlines is restricted from allowing Corporate to begin American Connection service at RDU based on collective bargaining agreements with the Allied Pilots’ Association that prohibit regional carriers not owned by American from operating the service on routes that do not touch an American hub airport on one end. RDU is not defined as an American hub in the agreement, he wrote.
American Airlines and the unions are “continuously engaged in constructive dialogue…covering a wide variety of issues,” Bowler wrote. The dialogue has not so far produced the waiver. Tippet’s office received the letter April 13.
“The need for improved or re-established scheduled air service at the six coalition communities is as important today as when the grant proposal was submitted this past June 2003,” Williams wrote to Teresa Bingham, an aviation analysis associate director for the U.S. Department of Transportation. “In light of this latest communiqué from American Eagle, we have redoubled our efforts to find suitable partners to provide this essential connection to the nation’s air transportation network for the coalition.”
Williams expressed gratitude to the federal agency’s “trust and patience. We ask that your support to the coalition continue as we endeavor to overcome these unfortunate and uncontrollable setbacks.”
Caleb Miles, CEO and President of the Convention and Visitors Bureau in Moore County, is a member of a task force working to recruit a passenger airline service to Moore County.
He said Tuesday that he and other task force members are continuing to discuss options and plan to regroup after losing a second key member in less than a year.
Michael Shouse, executive director of the Moore County Airport Authority, is resigning effective May 31. Longtime airport supporter and authority member J.T. Cotner died a few months ago. Both were members of the air service task force.
“The task force is still in place,” Miles said Tuesday in a telephone interview. “We plan to operate in a similar way as before. This is a challenging time of the year, with the (tourism) season.
“Other options are being looked at. The grant (a $1.2 million federal grant for the six-community consortium to restore or enhance diminished service) is still there, and that’s a big plus.”
Miles said Shouse “did some very good things for the community and the task force. You could tell he was passionate about restoring service.”
He also said Shouse, as the staff person working for the airport authority, did a lot of coordination and legwork on behalf of the task force, whose other members are volunteers or represent other agencies not dealing directly with Federal Aviation Administration and state Aviation Division officials and regulations.
Miles said he heard some say the Corporate Airlines deal is still possible.
Corporate Airlines CEO Doug-las Caldwell was quoted by a participant in an April 7 meeting in Raleigh as saying he “feels it may not be totally out of the question.”
The remaining members of the local task force appointed by the Authority are Miles, Peter Stilwell, marketing director of Pinehurst Resort, Assistant County Manager Mike Griffin and Bob Hawkins, a retired airline executive.
The task force was formed in 2002 to try to restore commercial passenger airline after US Airways Express ended roundtrip service out of Charlotte Douglas International Airport. The airline terminated the service in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the continuing financial struggles facing the airline industry.
The task force first tried to work out something with US Airways before turning to Corporate, a Smyrna, Tenn.-based regional carrier that flies connector flights for American Airlines in the Midwest and Northeast.
The carrier had operated a regional service for a time out of New Bern and Kinston, two of the members of the consortium.
The others in consortium are Fayetteville, Wilmington and Hickory. All have been meeting every month with the N.C. Department of Transportation aviation division officials.
The once-imminent deal with Corporate helped attract a $1.2 million federal grant.
Garner told The Pilot earlier he might attend the next planned meeting of the consortium on Thursday in Raleigh.
Williams told The Pilot in a Monday telephone interview that he expected the consortium would discuss other options to Corporate Airlines but he could not detail what they may be.
He said the discussion would be more advanced that just a “brainstorming” session.
