I really have some reservations about some of the posters on this thread.
I used to fly quite frequently to a little airport in the US called Fernandina beach.
It was a bit of a weekend retreat for the NY hoi paloi, very expensive condo's, resorts and golf courses. Friday afternoon the circuit was full of heavy metal traffic from NY.The airport was quite busy most times due to several maintenance businesses and quite a lot of training.
When you were cleared off centre with an instruction to call on the ground, you called the unicom. This was run by an ex navy carrier pilot, a paraplegic, in a wheelchair due to an unfortunate accident. He received no remuneration for his services, but he was there every day providing traffic information and weather information, I think that was his reason for getting out of bed every day.
Having flown all over the US from Alaska to Florida as well as Canada the local unicom operator provided useful service at no cost.
I sometimes wonder as I read some of the comments from the sky gods on here,
why are you so negative? Is this just a Dick bashing Phobia you have?
Does what he is suggesting cost you personally? or the operator you work for?
Does a unicom affect you or your operation in any way? In the US and Canada its provided at no cost to anyone, its up to you if you use the information provided.
Its only a dumb ass ill informed country like Australia takes a simple system and complicates it into a convoluted expensive mess.
A unicom may or may not provide any safety benefit at all, but does it really matter? it costs nothing so why are so many of you so negative? From my experience it might just save your neck one day, then again it might not.