AERIAL TRAFFIC JAM

The Wild Blue Needs Better Signals THE U.S. is rapidly running out of air space. To the groundling, the skies may seem unlimited, but the traffic problem in the nation's air lanes is almost as bad as on the highways. On some days, the four New York City airports handle 2,300 take-offs and landings--a round-the-clock average of one every 39 seconds--in a space 60 air miles wide and 40 air miles long.

Since 1946, air-passenger miles have more than doubled, to 16 billion last year. Not only has the number of commercial planes in use soared from 674 to some 1,300, but the air is also filled with thousands of private and military planes. When bad weather slows landings and takeoffs, the traffic problem becomes dangerously acute over the nation's four busiest airways: Boston-Norfolk, New York-Chicago, San Francisco-San Diego, Seattle-Portland, Ore. Planes bound for New York are often held up for an hour in Cleveland until the congestion over Manhattan can be ended. Delays are not only irritating to passengers, but costly to airlines. "Stacking" (i.e., circling, awaiting landing permission) costs airlines from $156 to $360 per plane-hour.

Like the theory of relativity, the flight space problem is fourth-dimensional. Under instrument conditions, each commercial airplane in flight must be protected by a cocoon of air space 30 miles long, 1,000 ft. deep and ten miles wide. Its protection must be so great because present instruments do not tell a pilot exactly where he is. But the piston pilot's problems are insignificant when measured against the problems of the jet pilot. The Civil Aeronautics Administration estimates that 35% of its traffic is military, and well over half these planes are jets. Above the major U.S. cities jet operations already saturate all air space between 20,000 ft. and 40,000 ft. When a piston-engine plane makes its final approach at La Guardia field, it needs no more than 15 square miles of space over Long Island. But a 550-m.p.h. jet requires more than 1,000 square miles.

What is the solution to the traffic jam? CAAdministrator Frederick B. Lee, a crack pilot who during World War II literally wrote the military's book for instrument flying, thinks the answer lies in 1) better position finders on the ground and in the air, and 2) better communications between airports and pilots. By thus extending the range of the aerial police, traffic jams can be stopped before they develop. A basic need on the ground is long-range radar equipment, a high-cost item that only a small percentage of U.S. airports now has. CAA's proposal: connect airport control towers to the Air Force's long-range radar warning net, which is already in operation near most big U.S. cities. While there are still some technical problems to be worked out, CAA is confident that a way can be found to use Air Force radar without interfering with defense.

In the air, the big need is for broader use of Distance Measuring Equipment, which, with VOR (very high-frequency radio signals), tells a pilot where he is within one-half a nautical mile. To install the DME system will cost the airlines about $6,000 a plane. Says T.W.A. President Ralph Damon: "Certainly, we have no objection to putting a $6,000 device in a million-dollar plane--if it will work. But that's a pretty big if. The system has not been too well demonstrated to date." But Pan American World Air ways started using DME on some of its planes last spring and is "very pleased." Nevertheless, other airlines have dragged their feet, even though CAA has installed more than half of the necessary ground equipment.

To get the most out of long-range radar, VOR and DME, better communications are needed between ground and air. The airlines want a more complete net of Government-built communications control stations, enabling airports to talk directly with pilots several hundred miles away (maximum range in most places is now 30 miles). With such new radar, DME and communications equipment, the airport control tower at La Guardia could pick up a plane an hour out, slow it up if necessary, reserve a landing time and guide it to a straight-in landing. By thus eliminating stacking, much wasted air space could be reclaimed.

Since 1947, the Federal Government has spent $192.7 million in aid to airports, a sum that was matched by states and localities. But last fiscal year Congress appropriated nothing, and this year only a piddling $20.5 million, though the number of airports has increased by 50% (to 6,790) since World War II. As the U.S. streaks on into the. jet age, Congress must be prepared to appropriate more money for airport improvement--and the airlines must keep their own equipment up to date in the air. A little more public and private (i.e., airline) money would go a long way toward breaking the traffic jam on the airways, before it cripples air transportation.

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