Does anybody know why the US is so much better at air traffic control than Europe ? For instance, Lille Approach panicking when they have more than 5 aircraft inbound to land at any given time whilst Urbana Champaign doing this effortlessly ? [No intention to be polemic here, or to wallow in stars or stripes - just want to understand]
Proudprivate,
I've flown a fair bit in the USA and a lot around Europe (including flying a piston twin into some of the busiest airports). I'd say that, barring the odd anomaly, ATC in Europe is very good - once you are actually airborne. The problems in Europe are pre-flight ones, relating to ATC management and, most often, Airport management.
The basic premise that airports are part of the public transport infrastructure and that GA is a mainstream user of airports and airspace, deserving full access with minimum inconvenience and cost is simply absent in the psyche of how aviation is managed in most of Europe.
The other thing no-one can explain to me is why Avgas in the US costs about the same as Jet A1, whilst in Europe, Avgas PRETAX is twice as expensive as Jet A1 PRETAX. The pretax delta between avgas and avtur is now greater than what avgas used to cost a few years ago.
That's crazy. You guys must all be pretty rich
I forgot to add we increasingly feel lucky if we can pay $15/usg for avags, it has been discontinued at many larger airports.