Although we bag ATC from time to time on the whole they do a pretty good job.
However they could keep us pilots a bit more in the loop at times. Like the original poster mentioned re the speed up slow down requests.
So often you get told to go fast only to the told by the next sector go slow, no wonder the reaction of (thought not spoken) "WTF we've just been told to go fast now you want us to slow down what are you guys smoking down there". A bit of a heads up like "we need you fast for the next XX minutes/miles to fit in a gap" might help at times a bit like Steady Eddie used to do.
Last edited by 27/09; 7th Feb 2012 at 05:59.