Originally Posted by
Jimmy Hoffa Rocks
Personally and behalf of my passengers I am tired of the air traffic controls strikes. Delay slots and cancelled flights, in the end many passengers blame the airlines.
Its time for both parties to resolve their differences and sit down and find a solution, enough already. Have you been affected?
Walsh should simply quit complaining if ATM/ATC fees go up a bit to fund increased hiring.
The Barcelona ACC guys have gone from working a 5-days-on, 3-days-off schedule to being forced into a 6-on, 2-off schedule. This is because of short staffing. The staffing is short because the users whine about user fees all the time... and the users are the airlines.
So, really, when the passengers blame the airlines, they're correct. If the airlines paid a bit higher ATM/ATC fees, the ATM providers could hire more people, and the controllers would be happy, and they wouldn't go on strike.
And "they should sit down and work out their differences" is silly. They TRIED sitting down and working it out. That didn't work. Going on strike is what you do next when sitting down and talking it out doesn't work.