STATEMENT OF

DR. KARLIN TONER,
DIRECTOR,
JOINT PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT OFFICE,
FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION,
AND
SENIOR STAFF ADVISOR TO THE SECRETARY OF TRANSPORTATION,

ON

NEXTGEN: LONG-TERM PLANNING AND INTERAGENCY COOPERATION,

BEFORE THE

HOUSE COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE,
SUBCOMMITTEE ON AVIATION,

APRIL 21, 2010.

Chairman Costello, Congressman Petri, and Members of the Subcommittee:

Thank you for inviting me here today to discuss the Joint Planning and Development Office’s (JPDO) work in long-term planning and interagency cooperation in developing the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen). When I appeared before you last March, I was on detail from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to the Department of Transportation (DOT) as the Senior Staff Advisor for NextGen coordination. In that capacity, I also served as the liaison between the NextGen partner departments and agencies and the Chair of the Senior Policy Committee, Secretary LaHood. I am appearing before you today as the new Director of the JPDO, a position that I have had the privilege of serving in since late February of this year. Secretary LaHood and Administrator Babbitt have committed to advancing and accelerating NextGen, and I am eager to help carry out their vision.

As this Committee is aware, NextGen is changing the way the national airspace system operates – with goals to improve safety, reduce congestion, noise, and emissions, expand capacity to meet future demand, and improve the passenger experience. NextGen is not a single piece of equipment or a program or a system that will instantaneously transform the air transportation system. NextGen builds on legacy systems to modernize air traffic control and ultimately will deliver a series of programs that transform the National Airspace System (NAS). NextGen takes advantage of relatively new technologies that have already been transforming our personal lives and the way we do business, such as GPS, analog-to-digital, and network-to-network data sharing.

Parts of NextGen are already being implemented. The aviation community has done a tremendous amount of work with planning, research and development, testing, and deployment. Research products are maturing and operational capabilities are moving into place to enable aircraft to fly as efficiently on rainy days as they do on sunny days. In fact, the FAA has deployed Automatic Dependant Surveillance - Broadcast (more commonly known as ADS-B) ground infrastructure and is now providing operating capability over the Gulf of Mexico and some operators are already reaping these benefits of more efficient travel. Still, the next few years are critical to the transformation of the national air transportation system – a system that must meet the civil aviation, defense, and homeland security needs of the United States.

As NextGen moves forward, the role of the JPDO has also evolved. Initially, the office was created by Vision-100 as an interagency group to work across government and with the industry to define the NextGen integrated plan. During the earlier planning stages, I was fortunate to be part of that visionary group as a National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) researcher serving on an integrated product team, helping to brainstorm ideas and concepts that might benefit the modernization of our air transportation system. As the planning matured, the JPDO focused more exclusively on the long-term research planning.

On November 18, 2008, Executive Order 13479 was issued. Entitled “Transformation of the National Air Transportation System,” it required the Secretary of Transportation to establish within the DOT a staff, including employees from other departments and agencies involved in NextGen, to support the Secretary and the Senior Policy Committee. The partner departments and agencies include the FAA, NASA, DOT, the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, and Commerce, and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. The Senior Policy Committee, which sets the policy direction for NextGen, is chaired by the Secretary of Transportation, and includes the Secretaries, Administrators, and Directors of the above agencies, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence as an ex officio member.

Late last year, Secretary LaHood asked Administrator Babbitt to redefine the duties of the Director of the JPDO to include the NextGen Senior Staff Advisor responsibilities. In restructuring these duties, Administrator Babbitt designated that the Director report directly to the FAA Deputy Administrator. Thus, the JPDO Director’s position has been elevated for increased responsibility and visibility within the FAA. Additionally, by wrapping the Senior Staff Advisor duties into the Director’s position, this realignment brings greater DOT involvement directly to the JPDO by formalizing the support relationship of the JPDO to the Secretary and the Senior Policy Committee.

The new organization’s strength is its connections and its ability to leverage the best of the Executive Order and the enabling legislation. The realignment has raised the visibility of the office, in keeping with the Administration’s commitment to advancing NextGen. With direct access to both the FAA Deputy Administrator and the Secretary of Transportation, the JPDO is able to have regular, high-level input from senior policymakers at both FAA and DOT.

Moreover, the Director’s new responsibilities expand the opportunity for collaboration among agencies. It is critical that we effectively and efficiently leverage the work of other agencies to achieve our NextGen goals.  When issues arise involving more than a single agency, the JPDO provides a forum for engagement and monitors follow-up of the partner agencies on decisions.

We directly provide interagency support to the cabinet-level officials on the Senior Policy Committee. As the JPDO Director, I continue to serve as Secretary LaHood’s advisor for NextGen and liaison to the partner agencies. In my prior role as NextGen advisor, I worked to institutionalize NextGen across the Office of the Secretary of Transportation while reaching out to the JPDO for multi-agency staff support. The realignment of the JPDO streamlines and solidifies that support.

The NextGen vision, expressed in the JPDO’s Concept of Operations, contains a wide variety of possible ideas that might be helpful to meet our Nation’s air traffic needs. However, neither the vision nor avenues being considered are static. NextGen capabilities are beginning to be implemented today, and as we gain experience, our past work will help us refine how we more effectively implement future NextGen goals.

Today’s world is different than the one in which the NextGen Concept of Operations was originally envisioned. The economy, the airlines, the environment, energy issues, and our security needs have changed dramatically. To account for these changes, we must take a more flexible approach to longer-term NextGen planning, blending evolution and transformation to meet the national needs for air transportation. We must test and prioritize our options against these realities.

My job is to refine our longer-term goals, by accounting for the changing realities of our aviation world. For example, more precise navigation (RNAV/RNP) is better understood to be an underpinning not only for capacity and efficiency, but may give us much better environmental performance as well. Conversely, the market of very light jets has diminished and our plans should reflect that. We also need to recognize that NextGen capabilities will be implemented where they are needed and best suited; for example, closely spaced parallel runways won’t be a solution for everyone – only for some airports.

With this in mind, we expect that by 2025, our system will still rely on pilots and air traffic controllers, but their roles will be different than they are today, and may be different from what we currently predict them to be in 2025. We want to make sure that they will have the tools and systems they need to perform their functions safely and effectively.

We also intend to continue to consult with industry as we move forward. Given where we are in implementation, we are assessing how industry can best contribute to longer-range plans, and I have asked some of our industry groups to give me ideas on how best to leverage their expertise and input.

The JPDO has some past successes that I plan to build on with regard to interagency cooperation. We can use our experiences working in these contexts as models for future interagency coordination on other projects.

For example, the JPDO is working with the Department of Commerce (through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)), FAA, and DOD on developing a vision for aviation weather management that is focused on the aviation user. We need to know how to best put weather information in a format that can be used by pilots, controllers, and dispatchers. The concept, called NextGen Network Enabled Weather (NNEW) enables the publication of the same weather information to all airspace users. NOAA’s role is to provide quality weather data to all its users including weather that meets the FAA’s Air Traffic Control (ATC) requirements. The FAA integrates the weather forecast information into tools expressly for air traffic management. The JPDO facilitates an active senior executive panel, known as the NextGen Executive Weather Panel, who oversaw the development of a joint program plan. A technology transition team will work out the specific technical requirements. A prototype demonstration will connect interagency products thus demonstrating information sharing protocols.

As the new Director of the JPDO, I am looking at all of the possibilities for successful interagency cooperation. We are fortunate that with the increased visibility and responsibility of the JPDO, and the Administration’s focus on NextGen, we now have even more tools in the toolbox to choose from to ensure productive partnerships throughout the government. Of course, the more productive these cooperative efforts are, the better service the FAA can provide to the traveling public.

Chairman Costello, Ranking Member Petri, Members of the Subcommittee, thank you again for inviting me here today. This concludes my prepared remarks. I would be happy to answer any questions that you may have.

Statement of

Jeff Wiese
Associate Administrator for Pipeline Safety
Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration
U.S. Department of Transportation

Before the

Committee on Homeland Security
Subcommittee on Management, Investigations, and Oversight
United States House of Representatives

Field Hearing - - Plant City, FL

April 19, 2010

Chairman Carney, members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the invitation to speak to each of you today. My name is Jeff Wiese, Associate Administrator of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration’s (PHMSA) pipeline safety program.

We greatly appreciate this Subcommittee’s attention to our efforts in advancing safety, which is the top priority of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and PHMSA Administrator Cynthia Quarterman.

As the only modal administration within the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) that doesn’t involve moving people, PHMSA still bears a significant responsibility in ensuring the safety of our most important stakeholders, American citizens. Today, I will speak to the challenges we face in the coexistence of people and pipelines in our communities and the ways we are working to address safety risks.

The nation’s pipelines, our energy highways, are a significant part of our country’s critical infrastructure and are essential to our economy and our way of life. Over 2.5 million miles of natural gas and hazardous liquid pipelines crisscross the country transporting nearly two-thirds of the energy products we consume annually. Pipelines are by far the safest way to transport such enormous quantities of hazardous products over long distances in short time intervals.

Safety: PHMSA’s Primary Mission

Strong oversight has been an important strategy in strengthening pipeline safety. Ensuring the safety of the nation’s hazardous liquid and natural gas pipeline network is an enormous task. To assist us in this feat, PHMSA utilizes the help of its state agency partners, giving us the opportunity to employ over 400 additional inspectors to oversee 81 percent of the infrastructure. State and federal inspectors train together to enforce national regulatory pipeline safety standards. We aim to function as a coordinated workforce to safeguard the American public from the risks pipelines pose. With over 30,000 miles of pipelines in the state, Florida has a significant piece of this critical network right here within its borders. To assist us in our efforts, PHMSA has an agreement with the Florida Public Service Commission to oversee intrastate natural gas pipelines – those that provide gas to homes and businesses. For all other pipelines in Florida, including anhydrous ammonia lines, PHMSA is chartered with the inspection, enforcement, and safety assurance of pipelines. The Federal-State partnership is a crucial component to our safety strategy and our ultimate success.

Over the years, PHMSA has taken a hard look at incidents, their causes, and what can be done to prevent them. One thing is clear – the leading cause of incidents in which people are hurt or killed is a result of third party damages. This type of damage, which includes vandalism, causes an immediate rupture or damage that later grows to failure. Third party damage most often occurs on natural gas distribution systems located in areas where people live and work, but it also poses a significant threat to larger pipelines such as anhydrous ammonia, natural gas, crude oil and other hazardous liquid pipelines.

Our record in pipeline safety is good. We have seen the number of serious pipeline accidents – those involving death or injury – decline by an average of 30 percent for the ten year period of 1999-2008. In Florida, the state has seen an average of one serious pipeline accident a year over the past five years compared to a national five year average of 41. This data is proof that our strategy of enhancing our oversight is working. Nevertheless, we recognize that one serious pipeline accident per year in Florida is still one too many and our ultimate goal is zero.

Addressing the November 2007 Pipeline Incident

Throughout the country anhydrous ammonia is commonly used as a chemical compound for agricultural fertilizer because of its rich nitrogen composition. The product is also used as an industrial refrigerant for agricultural retailers.

The U.S. contains nearly 4,500 miles of anhydrous ammonia transmission pipelines and PHMSA is the primary safety regulator for all of them. There have been 53 reported accidents on anhydrous ammonia pipelines since 2002 and of these, 15 percent were attributed to vandalism.

As we have seen here in Florida, occurrences with anhydrous ammonia pipelines can result in very tragic consequences. Since the year 2000, Tampa Bay Pipeline Company (TBPC) experienced three incidents involving its anhydrous ammonia pipeline, two of which were caused by vandalism. The most recent incident occurred on November 12, 2007 in which three teenagers drilled a hole into the pipe, immediately releasing product and a vapor cloud into the surrounding area, causing serious injuries to one of the teens and requiring the hospitalization of several fire fighters. In addition to these consequences, 300 people were evacuated from their homes as a safety precaution.

Vandalism to pipeline facilities is considered a deliberate act of sabotage and is therefore a security-related issue. To ensure security related issues concerning pipelines are adequately addressed, PHMSA entered into an Annex to a Memorandum of Understanding with the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) acknowledging TSA’s lead role in transportation security. Both agencies possess a shared commitment to a systems risk-based approach and to the development of practical solutions. The Annex recognizes that each agency brings core competencies, legal authority, resources, and expertise to this shared mission of protecting the public, but that the ultimate authority for pipeline security lies with the TSA.

As with any pipeline incident with security implications, PHMSA immediately held discussions with the TSA to identify jurisdictional authority, roles, responsibilities, and possible subsequent actions of each agency to remediate the situation following the November 2007 TBPC failure.

We investigated the company’s response and evaluated the adequacy of their processes, training and equipment to prepare for and respond to threats to their pipeline. Pipeline operators are required by law to have emergency procedures, conduct emergency training, and maintain liaison with local public officials and emergency responders. In addition, to augment our understanding of the company’s response activities, PHMSA participated in a multi-agency “After Action” review meeting with emergency responders, law enforcement, Florida transportation and environmental management agencies, local school officials and the media. Finally, PHMSA completed a comprehensive follow-up inspection, examining TBPC well beyond its emergency response issues.

When examining operator compliance, PHMSA looks for more than just fulfillment of routine maintenance requirements. We expect operators to incorporate all Federal and State regulations, including training staff, educating the public, and installing effective emergency response procedures.

During our investigation of the TBPC accident, we found the company’s response procedures were inadequate in a number of areas including public awareness, record-keeping, personnel qualification, liaison with public officials, emergency response procedures, and training. As a result of our investigation, PHMSA issued TBPC a Notice of Probable Violation which included a Proposed Civil Penalty of $398,000 and a Proposed Compliance Order to restore safety assurance and readiness within its pipeline operations.

Keeping Communities Ready to Respond

Looking at the TBPC incident and holding discussions with the Hillsborough County emergency response community, PHMSA decided to increase its efforts in promoting anhydrous ammonia transportation safety in the Tampa area. In late August of 2008, PHMSA hosted its Emergency Response to Anhydrous Ammonia Transportation Incidents Roundtable before an audience of emergency response man­agement personnel, anhydrous ammonia industry stakeholders, and transportation industry representatives to dis­cuss and share safety perspectives and best practices. The workshop further advanced the emergency response community’s knowledge of anhydrous ammonia and their understanding of how to appropriately respond to incidents should they occur. In addition, PHMSA worked with the TSA to hold an additional invitation-only workshop for law enforcement and security agencies involved in planning for Super Bowl activities in the Tampa area. The law enforcement community was able to benefit from discussions about pipeline security and threats and vulnerabilities concerning ammonia transportation.

Damage Prevention: Helping communities deal with pipeline safety has always been a priority of PHMSA. At the top of our list remains using the best information available to guide our excavation damage prevention efforts. Working with the Common Ground Alliance and all the underground damage prevention stakeholders, we have supported educating the public on the importance of calling the national 811 phone number, to help prevent damage to pipelines during an excavation. Pipeline operators believe that this number is effective in preventing damage to their facilities, and many are voluntarily adding this number to their permanent pipeline markers. In addition, we target for assistance those states whose risk of construction related damage is the greatest or those states in which the potential for improvement is real. We are putting representatives in the field to help explain the benefits of effective damage prevention and have invested in research to improve excavation location and communications technology so that the one call notification system is more accurate, works faster, and contributes to a safer work place.

Guiding Safe Land Use Decisions: There are other ways to help communities live safely with pipelines. One of the most important of these is guiding communities to make safe land use decisions. Building on the model of the Common Ground Alliance, we have called stakeholders together in a similar model, called Pipeline and Informed Planning Alliance (PIPA). This is a follow-up activity to a mandate of the Pipeline Safety Improvement Act (PSIA) of 2002, and results from a recommendation by the National Academy of Science’s Transportation Research Board.

National Pipeline Mapping System: A companion effort is helping communities understand where pipelines are located, who owns and operates them, and what other information is available for community planning. Following the passage of the PIPES Act, PHMSA worked with the Department of Homeland Security/Transportation Security Administration to resolve concerns about security sensitive information. Vital information that communities need for land use, environmental and emergency planning around pipelines is publicly available through PHMSA’s National Pipeline Mapping System (NPMS). We continue to work with states, industry and other stakeholders to make the NPMS information more accurate and more useful. Additionally, we have completed a review of thousands of operators’ public education programs and provide operators with feedback.

PHMSA works hard to provide communities with the information they need to make informed decisions and live safely with pipelines, but like the ammonia incident, accidents can and do still happen. In almost all instances, it is our firefighters and other emergency officials who are first to arrive at the scene of a dangerous pipeline incident. In light of this, we support the development of training material and educational seminars to help educate emergency responders in how to safely respond to emergency pipeline situations.

Emergency Responder Training Materials: Through our relationship with the National Association of State Fire Marshals (NASFM), PHMSA has gained a better understanding of the informational needs of the fire service and utilized NASFM state contacts to conduct outreach and training for local emergency responders. Our Pipeline Emergencies training curriculum and course materials offers a comprehensive, integrated emergency response training program designed to teach emergency responders and pipeline industry personnel to safely respond and effectively manage pipeline incidents. In addition, PHMSA is providing $500,000 to NASFM this year to support the update of Pipeline Emergencies, including new hardcopy training books and DVD material that can be distributed to local fire service personnel. The training material will also include new sections on transportation of alternative fuels via pipelines and how to respond to ethanol pipeline incidents.

Conclusion

As you can see, our expanded partnerships with state and local officials are helping us to strengthen the effectiveness of our safety and prevention efforts.

PHMSA very much appreciates the opportunity to report on our pipeline safety program. We share your commitment to improving safety, environmental protection and reliability of our nation’s pipeline system.

Thank you. I would be pleased to answer any questions you have.

##

WRITTEN STATEMENT OF

GREGORY D. WINFREE
ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

BEFORE THE

Subcommittee on RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE AND TECHNOLOGY
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

HEARING ON

Challenges and Future of Federal Surface Transportation Research

June 18, 2014

Chairman Bucshon, Ranking Member Lipinski, and Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the challenges and future opportunities of the Department of Transportation’s surface transportation research programs.  We all recognize that transportation research, technology and data are critical tools for improving the safety, efficiency, mobility, capacity and state of good repair of America’s transportation systems; and for reducing transportation’s environmental and societal impacts.  The Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology is pleased to continue to lead the Department of Transportation’s research coordination efforts, driving cross-modal collaboration to meet 21^st Century challenges.

Continual development and adoption of new processes and advanced technologies are improving safety, reducing project delivery times, improving system operations and capacity, extending the life of transportation infrastructure, and providing actionable information to travelers and transportation planners.  As Secretary Anthony Foxx noted at January’s Transportation Research Board’s Annual Meeting, research and data have a significant role to play in addressing America’s infrastructure deficit by improving planning and adopting innovative best practices; stretching scarce resources with well-researched, data-driven innovation resulting in smarter capital projects which are built better and cost less.  A good example of this is accelerated bridge construction, reducing the time for small bridge replacement – saving funds which can then be used for other work.

The future of the U.S. surface transportation system has the potential to be a safer, cleaner, more efficient, durable and resilient system if the necessary research is performed and results implemented to transform the current system into a system suitable to meet the nation’s needs for personal mobility and goods movement for the 21st century.  I see a system with highly automated vehicles of all types -- autos, trucks, trains and buses -- using alternative, non-fossil-fuel energy; and running on infrastructure that is constantly monitored, both for operational efficiency and infrastructure status, that is made of new, high technology materials that will last a century rather than decades.

We cannot create a transformational system by applying 21st century research to 20th century infrastructure.  In other words, we cannot just keep finding better ways to fill pot holes. The National Academies, through the National Research Council, issued a report entitled “Framing Surface Transportation Research for the Nation’s Future.” Funded by the state departments of transportation, one of the report’s conclusions is that the USDOT needs to increase the amount of advanced research that it conducts or sponsors, to meet emerging challenges.[1]  At the same time, we need to continue existing long-term research, and core research into human factors for safety.  The Administration’s surface authorization proposal, the GROW AMERICA Act, will improve vehicle and passenger safety by advancing intelligent systems in vehicles and in smarter infrastructure across all modes, and by exploring new ways to utilize real-time information to aid the flow of goods along America's freight corridors.  The GROW AMERICA Act will accelerate deployment of surface transportation technologies and innovations in safety, infrastructure renewal, reliability, and capacity.

One example of successful advanced research is the Connected Vehicle program.  Funded by the Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Research program, the Department has completed the Connected Vehicle Safety Pilot program in Ann Arbor, Michigan. That research informed the resulting National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHTSA) February decision to move forward with vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication technology to enable significant accident avoidance and other safety applications in light duty vehicles.

Another opportunity for USDOT to execute advanced research is in reducing the greenhouse gases produced by the surface transportation sector.  All modes of surface transportation produce greenhouse gases and other pollutants, with resulting public health and environmental impacts.  The transportation sector was responsible for 28% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2012.  Light vehicle use alone in the U.S. is responsible for 45% of the global production of vehicular CO₂ emissions.[2]  An advanced program focused on reducing greenhouse gas production in transportation would be a cross-modal effort involving all vehicular modes of travel in surface transportation, and is included in the proposals of the GROW AMERICA Act.

The Department of Transportation currently invests $804,726,000 (Fiscal Year 2014 enacted) in federal surface transportation research, development, and technology.  Within the USDOT, and its various Operating Administrations, the allocation of this funding is based on DOT goals and defined missions or priorities within the Operating Administrations.

Safety continues to be the number one priority of the USDOT.  Operating Administrations like the Federal Railroad Administration, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration have congressionally-mandated regulatory responsibility for safety within their individual modes.  As a result, the majority of the research conducted by these modes always will be safety oriented.  The same is increasingly true of the Federal Transit Administration.  With the new responsibilities placed on that Operating Administration by MAP-21 for transit system safety oversight, more of the research funded by FTA will be focused on safety.

The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) has by far the largest and widest-ranging research program of any of the surface modes.  Research sponsored or conducted by the FHWA ranges from operations to safety to structures and many areas in between.  The FHWA also has one of the few USDOT advanced research programs, the Exploratory Advanced Research program, which is relatively small (approximately $10 million per year in funding) but looks at means of applying new technologies, developed in other fields, to the transportation system.

The FHWA seeks and uses considerable stakeholder input when determining how research funds will be allocated.  These stakeholders include the state Departments of Transportation, Metropolitan Planning Organizations, local and tribal governments, construction and consulting engineering firms, and the Transportation Research Board.

One key research program managed by the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology is the University Transportation Centers (UTC) program.  The UTC program is another way the DOT supports advanced research, by enabling universities to use their cross-disciplinary capabilities to conduct the advanced work for which they are well-suited. 

Covering over 120 universities which bring expertise in multiple disciplines, both traditional (civil engineering) and not (public health, psychology and sociology, studying safety culture), UTCs enable the systemic, interdisciplinary, cross-modal research we need to address increasingly complex challenges that cross traditional boundaries. 

UTCs do this while educating undergraduate and graduate students in the technical and problem-solving skills we need moving forward – a “win–win” if I’ve ever heard one.  I always enjoy the opportunity to meet with the bright young students at our UTCs, to hear about what exciting new things they are developing in the laboratories and classrooms, and how their own lives are changing, even as they add to our transportation knowledge.  I encourage the members of this Committee to take those opportunities as well.

At this point, I would like to provide a brief overview of DOT research investments, the subjects of which are linked to one or more of the Departmental strategic goals: Safety, State of Good Repair, Economic Competitiveness, Livable Communities and Environmental Sustainability.

In safety, the highest priority across the DOT is the reduction of transportation-related fatalities and injuries.  This goal is being pursued by conducting research in many areas, including:

• Human behavior, operator distraction and fatigue.
• Connected Vehicles.
• Remote and wireless inspection of vehicles (trucks and trains).
• All types of vehicle crashworthiness (cars, trains, trucks, buses).

For state of good repair, some areas of emphasis are:

• Using of sensors for monitoring and non-destructive evaluation of infrastructure (bridges, roads, rails).
• Utilizing Asset Management tools to reduce maintenance costs.
• Reducing the frequency of infrastructure repair, rehabilitation, and re-construction.
• Building new structures that are more durable.

In the area of economic competitiveness, research is being conducted to:

• Improve traffic management to increase capacity and throughput.
• Create efficiencies in multi-modal freight movement.
• Use data to increase efficiency in freight logistics.
• Investigate the impact of financial policy on the efficiency of the overall transportation system.

For Livable Communities and Environmental Sustainability, research is being conducted to:

• Improve and increase access to transportation and human services for underserved populations.
• Help the traveling public make informed, multi-modal travel decisions.
• More safely integrate pedestrians and bicyclists into the system.
• Reduce energy consumption in operations, construction and maintenance.
• Increase the use of alternative fuel vehicles of all types.
• Adapt transportation infrastructure for resiliency to the effects of climate change and extreme weather events.

To summarize, research can reduce the gap that exists between the needs of the system and the funds available to operate and maintain the system, while improving the quality of life for the American public.

However, it takes time to implement new technologies, due to necessary approvals of the technology, environmental review, or other reasons.  Review and approval of new technologies is often a federal responsibility, requiring a waiver from existing regulations or guidance, or the adoption of updated technical standards.  Each Operating Administration endeavors to take actions within available resources to streamline these reviews, including involvement in standards developing organizations, assessing technology readiness, and listening to Advisory Boards and stakeholder groups, all to allow the implementation of new technologies as rapidly as possible.  The GROW AMERICA Act includes proposals to reduce environmental review time.

            I would like to provide more detail to the Committee about the Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) Research Program – both because it is managed directly by my office, and because it touches on all of the strategic themes of the Department’s surface transportation research.

In ITS research, some of our team’s progress has been attracting public attention – most notably through the ITS-funded Connected Vehicle Safety Pilot, the largest such test program in the world, conducted through the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute (UMTRI) in Ann Arbor, Michigan.  The Department tested safety applications with everyday drivers under both real-world and controlled test conditions.  These test results led to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHTSA) February decision to move forward with vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication technology for light duty vehicles. This technology will improve safety and has the potential to reduce non-impaired crashes by 80%.  It would do so by allowing vehicles to "talk" to each other and ultimately avoid many crashes altogether by exchanging basic, anonymous safety data, such as speed and position, ten times per second.  This major decision was based largely on the research, technology developments, test deployments, and data collections and analyses conducted under the ITS Research Program.  Research indicates that safety applications using V2V technology can address a large majority of crashes involving two or more motor vehicles. With safety data such as speed and location flowing from nearby vehicles, vehicles can identify risks and provide drivers with warnings to avoid other vehicles in common crash types such as rear-end, lane change, and intersection crashes.

But that’s certainly not all.  The Department continues to work collaboratively across the Operating Administrations towards connected vehicle applications for heavy duty vehicles, and our colleagues at the Federal Highway Administration are preparing to issue guidance in 2015 for installing vehicle-to-infrastructure applications for roadway safety and improved traffic operations and maintenance, drawing on the connected vehicle data that will be made available. 

ITS research has enabled multimodal Integrated Corridor Management (in part through demonstration projects in Dallas and San Diego), and Next Generation-911. Additionally ITS is using connected vehicle technology research to reduce congestion, improve road weather information and real-time data capture, and reduce emissions.

To enable the deployment of this technology, additional research is needed to address the technical and policy challenges.  The ITS program continues to assess the legal and policy structures needed to make these safety, operational and environmental improvements a daily reality, with an emphasis on ensuring data privacy and on the technologies enabling security of cyber-physical systems.  And, we continue to work actively with our partners in the standards developing organizations  to ensure that the many private sector actors involved in ITS deployment – from Original Equipment Manufacturers  to suppliers to technology firms to infrastructure and construction firms – all produce interoperable equipment and systems that can seamlessly share the data that enables safety and other applications.  We are conducting specific research on cyber-physical systems in collaboration with National Institute of Standards and Technology to ensure that these Connected Vehicle systems have sufficient security protections against any malicious cyber-attacks.  

Finally, I note that all of this success, and the standards that support it, are based upon the availability of the 5.9 GHz Dedicated Short Range Communications (DSRC) spectrum.  Allocated in the U.S. and internationally for transportation safety, the 5.9 GHz band was specifically selected to enable the ten-times-per-second exchange of information needed to bring to reality the safety improvements that remain the primary goal of ITS research.  We recognize that spectrum is a scarce national resource and that it is important to find ways to expand wireless broadband capacity. We are actively involved in the ongoing discussions related to the FCC’s proposal in its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to permit Unlicensed National Information Infrastructure  devices (e.g., broadband WiFi) to operate in the 5.9 GHz spectrum currently licensed for DSRC. The Department also intends to participate in the National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s (NTIA) upcoming technical analysis related to understanding interference and sharing of the 5.9 GHz spectrum.  We believe that the FCC and the NTIA must ensure that unlicensed devices do not compromise safety through harmful interference to the ITS architecture, operations, or safety critical applications if permitted to operate in the 5.9 GHz band. We have very serious concerns about any spectrum sharing that prevents or delays access to the desired channel, or otherwise preempts the safety applications. At this time, the Department is unaware of any existing or proposed technical solution which guarantees interference free operation of the DSRC safety critical applications while allowing WiFi enabled devices to share the 5.9 GHz spectrum.

            With regard to full implementation of this technology in the U.S., the success of the Ann Arbor Safety Pilot has provided clear momentum toward Connected Vehicle deployment.  The Department is planning to participate in additional Connected Vehicle pilot deployments in 2016.   USDOT expects that state DOTs and local governments will have multiple operational pilot deployments of Connected Vehicle infrastructure operating in local environments by the end of this decade.  A significant implementation of Connected Vehicle technology in vehicles, fleets, infrastructure, and aftermarket devices would follow soon thereafter.   Please keep in mind that vehicles are just one exciting application for connected technologies.  Indeed, applications can be found across the range of modes of transportation.

            In closing, I am excited about the research being conducted at the U.S. Department of Transportation.  We are addressing serious issues in serious ways for the benefit of the travelling public.  I look forward to answering your questions.

STATEMENT OF

GREGORY WOODS
DEPUTY GENERAL COUNSEL
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

BEFORE THE

OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM COMMITTEE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

CONCERNING

SUSPENSION AND DEBARMENT ACTIONS AT THE
DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

MARCH 18, 2010

Chairman Towns, Ranking Member Issa, and Members of the Committee:

I am pleased to appear before the Committee today with Inspector General Scovel to discuss the U.S. Department of Transportation's commitment to vigorous enforcement of the suspension and debarment requirements of Federal law that protect our acquisition, grant-making, and comparable programs from fraudulent behavior, favoritism, and other threats to effective stewardship of taxpayer funds.

The Department administers some of the most significant grant-making programs in the Federal government, and Secretary LaHood has made clear that maintaining the integrity of these programs, and of our acquisition actions, is one of our most fundamental responsibilities.  The Inspector General's comprehensive January report on this responsibility, and his earlier "ARRA Advisory" in May 2009, have been instrumental in bringing a new focus to the systematic implementation of suspension and debarment requirements across the Department.

I would like to review for the Committee the steps we have taken to strengthen the Department’s implementation of the suspension and debarment program along the lines addressed in the Inspector General's January Report.  Significantly, we have just issued an updated and more comprehensive Department Order that lays the groundwork for better management of the enforcement program across the Department.  A copy of our new Order, "Suspension and Debarment Procedures and Ineligibility," has been provided to the Committee.

The new Order clarifies and strengthens the oversight and management role of the Senior Procurement Executive.  The Order clearly requires that the Department take action to suspend or debar within 45 days of a referral by the Inspector General or others, or to document the reasons why action is not being taken.  Adherence to the suspension and debarment evidence standards provided under Federal regulations is also clearly specified.  The Department's Operating Administrations are also improving their programs, with an emphasis on ensuring that responsibilities are clearly delineated, information is well disseminated, and up-to-date procedures are employed to carry out timely suspension and debarment actions.  Secretary LaHood and the leadership of the Department are committed to ensuring that the Department is effectively fulfilling its responsibilities for this important program.

We are also improving the Office of the Secretary's SharePoint monitoring system for suspension and debarment actions.  Action is underway to update the existing tracking system with one that provides enhanced capabilities with regard to tracking and transparency, including automatic notice of needed actions.  While the system is at the prototype stage, we believe that it will assist us in strengthening management controls to better ensure timely action on referrals across the Department.

Management has also taken action to ensure that timely, accurate, and complete information is entered into the government-wide Excluded Parties List System (EPLS).  Immediately upon issuance of the OIG’s ARRA Advisory, the Office of the Senior Procurement Executive created a dedicated website to systematize the reporting of all suspension and debarment actions by the Operating Administrations and by the offices within the Office of the Secretary.  This data reporting also enabled the Department to maintain a centralized data collection point to monitor the full inventory of the Department’s open suspension and debarment cases.  Both of those functions are being incorporated into the new SharePoint System for monitoring and reporting on suspension and debarment activity in the Department of Transportation.

The Federal Highway Administration, which manages our largest grant programs, received considerable attention in the Inspector General's report.   FHWA has been particularly aggressive in implementing process and management improvements to better ensure timely and appropriate action is taken on suspension and debarment referrals.

Specifically, last Spring FHWA established a dedicated team within the Office of Chief Counsel to work with FHWA’s debarring official to identify, review and dispose of all referrals within established deadlines.  New protocols were instituted, which call for suspension or proposed debarment orders within 45 days of notification of an indictment from any source, or providing a written justification of why a suspension or proposed debarment order is not warranted under the circumstances.

In addition, the FHWA has undertaken a number of other important measures to improve case processing.  The Office of Chief Counsel has--

• increased the resources devoted to case processing;
• developed an action plan for dealing with priority cases, as well as the remaining open cases;
• established an electronic database and tracking system; and
• developed regularly updated case reports for review by FHWA management.

The FHWA Chief Counsel’s Office also developed revised detailed procedures for case processing – in the field and at headquarters – intended to ensure prompt action after a referral and timely follow-up actions.

These actions by FHWA are showing results.

• Beginning in May 2009, the Office of the Chief Counsel reviewed and updated a comprehensive inventory of 56 open cases.  The initial inventory identified 22 cases for priority treatment, and the FHWA has initiated actions in all those cases except two, which require additional information to proceed.
• As of March 10, 2010, action undertaken by FHWA has reduced the open cases to 32.  In order to ensure that taxpayer funds are fully and effectively protected as these cases are being pursued, all of these firms, with the exception of the two lacking full information, have been suspended, pending final decision on debarment.
• Of the six cases identified in the OIG ARRA advisory, three are now closed, two parties have been suspended, and FHWA is pursuing information on the final case prior to final disposition.
• Since the issuance of the Office of Inspector General report, FHWA has received three new referrals from the OIG.  Action in all three of these new cases was initiated within 45 days, in accord with the new protocols and Departmental Order.

As you know, a suspension is effective immediately, which means a suspension protects federal monies as completely as a debarment in the first instance.  I can therefore assure the Committee, notwithstanding the delays that occurred in closing open suspension cases that, except for the two cases noted above, respondents are now suspended in every open FHWA case, and the public is protected.

I would like to offer a clarification and updated information regarding a conclusion by the Inspector General's Office that Recovery Act funds were awarded to companies affiliated with individuals under indictment, as indicated in today's testimony.  The contracts supported by the Recovery Act funds in question were awarded by Kentucky to firms that shared an address with a company controlled by an individual that, at the time, was under indictment but has since been acquitted.  Also, the son of that indicted individual had an interest in both of the firms referred by the IG that received the Kentucky contracts in question Although we examined all of the facts about interconnections between these firms and the indicted individual, we could not conclude, based on the existing standards of evidence, that this constituted an "affiliation" that justified suspension and debarment. 

The indicted individual was one of three who have since been acquitted or have had charges dismissed. They received no Recovery Act funds individually or as a principal in a business.  These three individuals were suspended in July 2009 based on the September 2008 referral.  We recognize this gap is unacceptably long and, as I described earlier, we have taken steps to prevent this from happening again.  The effectiveness of our new process is borne out by the facts.  FHWA’s new  procedures in place have resulted in the three new referrals received by FHWA since the May 2009 to be acted upon  within the 45-day deadline.

The Department will take strong and prompt action to protect public funds.  As the Inspector General recommends, we will move swiftly to suspend affiliates of suspended or debarred contractors.  We believe, however, that the commitment does not diminish the due process rights of targeted firms or individuals.

Significant grant-making and acquisition actions are also carried out by the Federal Aviation Administration and the Federal Transit Administration.  These two Operating Administrations have also agreed to commit the resources needed to fully address the recommendations of the Inspector General's report.

In conclusion Mr. Chairman, we believe we have taken to heart the essential elements of the Inspector General's report -- to commit high-level management and more resources to suspension and debarment cases in order to ensure rigorous enforcement, and to take definitive action in a timely manner.  On behalf of Secretary LaHood and the other employees of the Department of Transportation, I want to assure you that we understand the importance of our duty to safeguard the public's money and their trust.

Working together with the Inspector General, we will work still harder so that the unscrupulous cannot participate in our grant programs and acquisitions, and potentially others across government.

Thank you again for the opportunity to discuss these important matters.  I would be pleased to answer any questions you may have.

Dr. Mark Rosekind
Administrator,
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
U.S. Department of Transportation

Hearing of the

U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee
Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies

Wednesday, November 16, 2016

Chairman Collins, Ranking Member Reed, and Members of the Committee:

Thank you for holding this hearing and inviting me to testify. My name is Mark Rosekind, and I am the Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, or NHTSA.

At NHTSA, our mission is to save lives on America’s roadways. For 50 years, we have carried out that mission by writing and enforcing strong regulations to make vehicles safer, fighting against drunk driving, building a national consensus about seatbelt use, and so many other efforts that have saved hundreds of thousands of Americans.

But we have far more work to do. And that work can be measured by some alarming numbers.

In 2015, we lost 35,092 people on our public roads. At NHTSA, we know that is not just a number. Every one of those is a mother or father, a son or daughter, a coworker, a friend. In the United States, we lose the equivalent of a fully-loaded 747 on our roadways every single week.

And the problem is getting worse. Last month we announced that roadway fatalities in the first half of this year are up over 10 percent.

It is against this backdrop that the Department of Transportation, under the leadership of Secretary Anthony Foxx, has been working so hard on our efforts to accelerate the safe deployment of automated vehicle technologies.

Because while automated vehicles carry enormous potential to transform mobility, reshape our transportation system and transform our economy, it is their awesome potential to revolutionize roadway safety that has us so motivated.

And there is one more number that helps explain why. That number is 94. That is the percentage of crashes that can be tied back to a human choice or error. That’s a choice to speed or drive drunk, to send a text message from behind the wheel or misjudge the stopping distance.

And that 94 percent figure represents the untold potential of automated vehicle technologies. We envision a future where advanced technologies not only help reduce crashes, but also make possible a world in which fully self-driving cars hold the potential to eliminate traffic fatalities altogether.

The Department of Transportation views this moment as the cusp of a new technological revolution that may transform roadway safety forever.

The Federal Automated Vehicles Policy, which the Department and NHTSA issued in mid-September, is the world’s first comprehensive government action to guide the safe and efficient development and deployment of these technologies. Today, I will discuss that Policy, how we developed it, and where we are going next.

In January of this year, Secretary Foxx made two important announcements.

First, he announced that President Obama was making a $3.9 billion budget request for automated vehicles research. This is a major commitment from the Administration to advance this technology, and DOT continues to strongly support this request.

Second, he directed NHTSA to write a new policy covering four areas: One, vehicle performance guidance for automakers, tech companies, researchers and other developers and testers of automated vehicle technologies. Two, a model state policy to build a consistent national framework for the testing and operation of automated vehicles. Three, an exploration of the use of our current regulatory tools that can be used to advance these technologies. And four, a discussion of possible new tools that the Federal government may need to promote the safe deployment of advanced technologies as the industry continues to develop.

Over the subsequent nine months, NHTSA hit the road, traveling to discuss automated vehicles with industry, academics, State governments, safety and mobility advocates, and the public. This Policy is the product of that significant input.

Before discussing the individual components, I would like to share a few thoughts about our approach.

First it is important to understand our traditional approach to regulating motor vehicles. For 50 years, our approach has largely been reactive. NHTSA has prescribed safety standards, and then responded to problems as they arise.

A traditional approach to regulating these new technologies would be to engage solely in rulemaking process, writing new regulations that prescribe specific standards. Our view is that approach would stymie innovation and stall the introduction of these technologies.

It would also be a long process. Rulemakings, and the research necessary to support them, take years, meaning that any rule we might offer today would likely be woefully out-of-date by the time it took effect, given the pace of technological development in this space. Let me be clear that using the notice-and-comment rulemaking process to establish new standards will absolutely play an important role as this technology matures and is adopted. But it is not the only tool in our bag, and we have created an innovative approach that will better serve both safety and innovation in the immediate term.

Our Policy represents a continuation of the new proactive safety approach that we have built at NHTSA under the leadership of Secretary Foxx. This Policy allows NHTSA to work with automakers and developers on the front end, to ensure that sound approaches to safety are followed throughout the entire design and development process. This is a new approach, and it’s going to take some adjustment for everyone involved. But we are confident that it will help us accomplish two goals: first, to make sure that new technologies are deployed safely; and second, to make sure we don’t get in the way of innovation.

As the Federal regulator with the responsibility of ensuring vehicles are as safe as they can possibly be, we play an important role on behalf of the American public to ensure that vehicle technologies do not present safety threats.

At the same time, we recognize the great lifesaving potential of these new technologies, and want to do everything we can to make sure that potential is fully realized and that they are deployed as quickly as possible to save as many lives as we can.

Some people have talked about safety and vehicle automation as on the opposite ends of a spectrum, as if there were a trade-off between safety and innovation. But at the Department of Transportation, we view our role as promoting safety innovation. Our Policy is designed to promote the safe and expeditious deployment of new technologies that have the potential to reduce crashes and save lives.

Our approach is not prescriptive. It does not tell developers how they must provide safety, but instead it builds a transparent and proactive approach to ensure that they are properly addressing the critical safety areas.

Finally, I want to be clear that while this Policy establishes an important framework for the development and deployment of automated vehicles, it is not the final word. In our view, this Policy is the right tool at the right time. It answers a call from industry, State and local governments, safety and mobility advocates and many others to lay a clear path forward for the safe deployment of automated vehicles and technologies.

But we intend this Policy to evolve over time. That evolution will be based on comments we receive from the public, our own experience in implementing it over the coming months and years, and, perhaps most importantly, based on the rapid evolution of the technology itself. We have designed this Policy to be nimble and flexible, to allow us to stay at the leading edge of this revolution.

Before I discuss each component of the Policy, allow me to say a few words on definitions.

First, it is important to note that with this Policy, we are officially adopting the SAE International levels of automation, ranging from zero to five. The primary focus of the Policy overall is on what we refer to as “highly automated vehicles”, or HAVs. Those are vehicles at levels three through five on the SAE level scale, or vehicles that—at least in some circumstances—take over full control of the driving task. A portion of the first section of the Policy also applies to Level 2 vehicle systems, which include advanced driver-assistance systems already on the road today.

The Policy covers all automated vehicles that are designed to operate on public roads. That includes personal light vehicles, as well as heavy trucks. It even includes vehicles that might be designed to not carry passengers at all.

Finally, I note that most of the Policy is effective immediately. We expect that developers and manufacturers of AV technologies will use the Policy to guide their safety approach. Some portions of the Policy—notably the Safety Assessment Letter in the Vehicle Performance Guidance—will become effective following a Paperwork Reduction Act process that we expect to be completed within the next few months.`

Vehicle Performance Guidance for Automated Vehicles

The first section is the Vehicle Performance Guidance for Automated Vehicles. This is guidance for manufacturers, developers and other organizations involved in the development of automated vehicles. The heart of the Guidance is a 15 point “Safety Assessment” that spells out the critical safety areas that developers should address for the safe design, development, testing and deployment of highly automated vehicles prior to the sale or operation of such vehicles on public roads.

The Safety Assessment covers areas such as the operational design domain—essentially the where and when an AV is designed to operate automatically—fallback conditions, cybersecurity, privacy, and the human-machine interface.

We identified these areas through our extensive consultations with industry, academia and advocates as the critical safety issues that must be addressed to ensure that automated technologies are safe.

Critically, the Guidance does not specify how AV developers are intended to address the areas. Instead, the Guidance asks developers to document their own processes and then provide NHTSA with a Safety Assessment letter in which they explain their approach. This process is expected to yield a variety of different approaches for every one of the areas. That is intentional, and is one of the ways that we are preserving and promoting the innovation process. Government does not have all the answers, and our view is that the more approaches that innovators take to solving these problems, the more likely we are to find the best way.

Model State Policy

The second section is the Model State Policy.

For the last 50 years, there has been a fairly clear division of responsibility between the Federal government and the States for the oversight and regulation of motor vehicles. Generally speaking, it has been the Federal government’s responsibility to regulate motor vehicles and equipment safety, while the States have regulated drivers and traffic laws.

That division of responsibility may be less clear in a highly automated vehicle world where increasingly the vehicle’s automated systems become the driver.

The Model State Policy delineates the Federal and State roles for the regulation of these vehicles, and it outlines the approach we recommend to States as they consider the regulation of testing and operation of automated vehicles on their public roads. Our goal is to build a consistent national framework for the development and deployment of automated vehicles, so that users can take their vehicles across state lines as they can today, and so that developers are building toward a single set of standards, rather than 50.

The Model State Policy confirms that States retain their traditional responsibilities for vehicle licensing and registration, traffic laws and enforcement, and motor vehicle insurance and liability regimes. At the same time, the Policy reaffirms that the Federal government will continue to be responsible for the oversight of vehicle safety and design, including automated features.

The Policy was developed in close coordination with the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA), individual States and other stakeholders. It suggests recommended areas for States to consider in the development of their own regulations, including testing regimes and registration. It also identifies a number of areas that need to be further discussed and developed, including how law enforcement will interact with highly automated vehicles, and the development of a consistent approach to insurance and liability challenges. We also note in the Policy that States do not have to take any action at all.

NHTSA’s Current Regulatory Tools

The third section addresses NHTSA’s Current Regulatory Tools. This section discusses how NHTSA will use the tools currently at its disposal to promote and expedite the safe development and deployment of highly automated vehicles.

The first of those tools discussed is our interpretation authority. The current Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards generally do not contemplate automated vehicle technologies. Therefore, it can sometimes be unclear how those standards apply to advanced technologies. In this section, we lay out the process by which developers of AV technologies can submit interpretation requests to the agency to determine whether and how their technologies conform with the standards. The agency also commits to a greatly expedited process for reviewing these interpretation requests. On simple safety-related interpretation requests, we commit to providing answers within 60 days. Compared to historical norms, that is lightning speed.

The second tool discussed is our exemption authority. Congress has granted NHTSA the authority to provide exemptions to manufacturers to deploy vehicles that do not conform to the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards. While these exemptions are admittedly limited—to 2,500 vehicles for each of two years—the Agency views this tool as an important way of enabling a manufacturer to put a test fleet on the road to gather critical safety data and improve its technologies. The Policy similarly commits to an expedited process on simple safety-related exemptions, providing an answer within six months from the application.

The Agency’s broadest power is its ability to write new safety standards. While this tool tends to take the longest amount of time—usually a period of years—it is the method that will ultimately allow for the large-scale deployment of nontraditional vehicle designs and equipment under consistent, broadly applicable standards.  In addition, to the extent that performance-based standards are adopted, this tool has the potential to allow for technological innovation while maintaining safety.

In this section, we also highlight that the Agency retains its broad defects and enforcement authority. We use that authority to investigate any unreasonable risks to safety, and to recall unsafe vehicles from the road. The same day NHTSA issued the Policy, we also issued an Enforcement Guidance Bulletin that makes clear that the Agency’s traditional enforcement authorities extend to advanced vehicle technologies.

Modern Regulatory Tools

The fourth and final section of the Policy discusses Modern Regulatory Tools, identifying 12 potential new tools, authorities and resources that could aid the safe deployment of new lifesaving technologies and enable the Agency to be more nimble and flexible.

Today’s governing statutes and regulations were developed before highly automated vehicles were even a remote notion. For that reason, current authorities and tools alone may not be sufficient to ensure that highly automated vehicles are introduced safely, and to realize their full safety promise. This challenge requires NHTSA to examine whether the ways in which the Agency has addressed safety for the last several decades should be expanded and supplemented.

The new tools identified in this section include premarket approval, expanded exemption authority, imminent hazard authority, new research and hiring tools, and others that may better equip the Agency in the future as more technologies move from the lab to the road. These tools are offered for consideration by policymakers, industry, advocates and the public as we move forward.

One thing we know for certain is that the agency will need additional resources as this technology develops and is adopted. I have great confidence in the NHTSA team’s expertise and ability. But it is undeniable that as more automakers move technology from the lab to the test track to the road, we will need to make sure our Agency is properly resourced to maintain pace.

We continue to support the President’s budget request for more research dollars, and are committed to working with you in the coming months and years to identify what resources—both in personnel and research funding—will be necessary to achieve our mission.

Next Steps

Finally, with respect to the Policy, I would like to highlight once again that we fully intend this Policy to be the first iteration of many to come. The Policy is effective now, and will continue to evolve based on feedback and our experience implementing it, and, most importantly, to keep pace with innovation. To that end, each section of the Policy highlights a series of next steps that we will take to implement and improve the Policy over time.

The first is our solicitation of public input. We are doing that through an open comment period that is open now through November 22^nd. NHTSA is also hosting a series of public workshops that began earlier this month on different sections of the Policy. I will note here that the full Policy, additional materials, and the portal for public comments can be found at www.nhtsa.gov/AV.

Over the coming months we will be engaging experts to review the Policy, issuing further guidance on the Safety Assessment letter, and engaging stakeholders across the spectrum to help flesh out other areas of the Policy. For example, we will work with law enforcement organizations to further the conversation about how AVs will interact with the police, and work with industry to build the framework for the data sharing discussed in the Vehicle Performance Guidance. We are also engaged with other operating modes throughout the Department of Transportation, recognizing the roles and responsibilities they play with respect to public transit, commercial freight operations, and the highway system on which automated vehicles will operate.

We do not pretend to have answered every question in this Policy, and we will continue the conversation with the public about the best ways to develop and improve our Policy as we learn more. To that end, the Department of Transportation has committed to reviewing and updating the Policy annually.

As I conclude, I want to say a few words about the importance of the present moment in history. We have an industry that is rapidly developing innovative new technologies. And we have a government that is inspired and excited about the future of this technology.

But that future is not without threats. Bad actors or bad incidents could threaten to derail our collective efforts.

I want to close with the words President Obama used when he announced our new Policy in an op-ed in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. He wrote, “There are always those who argue that government should stay out of free enterprise entirely, but I think most Americans would agree we still need rules to keep our air and water clean, and our food and medicine safe. That’s the general principle here. What’s more, the quickest way to slam the brakes on innovation is for the public to lose confidence in the safety of new technologies. Both government and industry have a responsibility to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

It is our strong view that the best way we can build that public confidence is by working together, showing the public that the government is on the side of innovation and the industry is on the side of safety. We encourage you to join with us as we continue to develop this Policy and show the American public that their safety is the highest priority for all of us.

Thank you.

TESTIMONY OF

JAMES H. WASHINGTON,
ACQUISITION EXECUTIVE,
AND
JOHN STAPLES,
DIRECTOR,
FLIGHT SERVICE PROGRAM OPERATIONS,
AIR TRAFFIC ORGANIZATION,
FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION,

BEFORE THE

HOUSE COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE,
SUBCOMMITTEE ON AVIATION

ON

THE TRANSITION FROM FAA TO CONTRACTOR-OPERATOR FLIGHT SERVICE STATIONS:  LESSONS LEARNED

October 10, 2007

Good Morning, Chairman Costello, Congressman Petri, I welcome the opportunity to appear before this Subcommittee, and discuss an important issue; the transition from the FAA to a contractor operated system of Automated Flight Service Stations.  My name is Jim Washington, and I am Vice President for Acquisition and Business Services of the Air Traffic Organization, and the Acquisition Executive for the Federal Aviation Administration.  Accompanying me is John Staples, Director of Flight Service Program Operations for the Air Traffic Organization. 

As you know, the FAA and our contract partner, Lockheed Martin, are working together to provide the customer with the best, most efficient and cost effective system of flight service stations possible.  Let me also state that efficiency and cost savings are not the first priority for the FAA and Lockheed Martin.  The first priority is, and always will be, the safety of the aviation system, no matter the size of the aircraft or the number of persons on board.

Let me take a moment here to quickly review the history of the Automated Flight Service Station contract.  On February 1, 2005, the FAA awarded a performance-based contract to Lockheed Martin for the services provided to general aviation pilots through a government network of 58 Automated Flight Service Stations (AFSSs). The contract was awarded following a 15-month A-76 study begun in 2003. 

Prior to the modernization effort, pilots could telephone, and in some cases visit, a flight service station in their area to receive weather information for their region and along their planned route, file a flight plan, and learn about flight restrictions and hazards along their route and at their destination airport.  During a flight, pilots could also radio the nearest flight service station to receive updated weather and hazard information, and receive emergency services, as conditions changed.  The FAA’s FSS system relied on outdated 1970s-era computer technology; maintaining and operating this obsolete system became increasingly difficult and expensive.  The General Accounting Office and the Department of Transportation’s Office of Inspector General both issued reports that were critical of the existing FSS system, and recommended consolidation of FSS locations, citing significant cost savings.  These reports helped drive the A-76 process which resulted in the contract award to Lockheed Martin.

Lockheed Martin was chosen to provide services based on a public private competition in which five bidders, including the FAA’s Most Efficient Organization (MEO), competed.  The total cost of the award was $1.8 billion covering an initial performance period of five years, with consecutive three-year and two-year award term options.  Expected savings and cost avoidances resulting from this contract are in the range of $2.2 billion in capital and labor over a 13-year period. 

As part of the bid, Lockheed Martin is expected to make improvements through the introduction of new processes and systems.  A new suite of equipment, Flight Services 21 (FS21), has been installed, providing information to specialists and pilots using this service.  There are plans for significantly more effective use of the Internet.  For the first time, internet users and pilot weather briefers will be able to see the same information while talking to each other.  Also, Lockheed Martin is consolidating the services provided by the 58 former FAA sites into 3 new Hubs (located in Leesburg, VA, Ft. Worth, TX, and Prescott, AZ.) and 15 refurbished existing facilities. 

On October 4, 2005, Lockheed Martin initiated the delivery of flight services to the flying public.  Lockheed Martin staffed all the AFSSs with incumbent employees and continued to provide flight services following the same policies and procedures used by the FAA on October 3, 2005.  From an existing FAA AFSS workforce of approximately 2,300 specialists, approximately 1,650 incumbent personnel accepted job offers from Lockheed Martin for day one of operations.  In February 2007, Lockheed Martin began implementation of its modernized FS21 system.  Currently, Lockheed Martin has almost completed its consolidation to 3 new hubs and 15 refurbished facilities.   The refurbished facilities have FS21 console equipment and other improvements.

This performance-based services contract is managed by the FAA through a combination of service requirements defined in a Performance Work Statement (PWS), service standards defined in a Performance Requirements Summary (PRS), and a quality management structure ensuring effective performance standards measurement as documented in a Quality Assurance Surveillance Plan (QASP). 

The Flight Services program requirements were conveyed to the contractor via a Performance Work Statement (PWS) which contained approximately 300 explicit service requirements in four high level categories Preflight Services, Inflight Services, Operational Services and Special Services.  The contract also incorporated by reference all relevant policies, orders, methodologies, procedures and regulations that govern how Flight Services are to be rendered by the FAA to the flying public. The PWS explicitly gave the contractor the flexibility to meet these service requirements using any reasonable and realistic system architecture and staffing approach.  The performance basis for the contract was set in a Performance Requirement Summary (PRS) which contains 21 service level metrics that define acceptable performance levels (APLs), enabling the government to measure contract performance and ensure the quality of service. These metrics were designed to reflect the overall service delivered by the FAA before the transition to a performance-based contract. 

On February 22, 2007, Lockheed Martin began the process of consolidating the 58 AFSSs in the continental United States, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico, into 18 facilities and implementing their new system, FS21.  FS21 includes all the system tools required for Lockheed Martin flight service specialists to provide services required by the FAA including weather briefings, flight planning, and air-to-ground services to the flying community.  Air-to-ground services include providing weather updates and aeronautical data, enroute flight advisory service, airport advisory service at select locations, activating and canceling flight plans, lost aircraft and emergency assistance.  As with the deployment of any new system or any consolidation, some issues have developed.  Many of these problems were anticipated and mitigations put in place prior to the start of transition; however some exceeded the anticipated level of service degradation.  In April of 2007, pilots began reporting excessive call wait times, dropped calls, lost flights plans, and specialists unfamiliar with expanded area knowledge.  During the same time period, reports of problems with issuing, disseminating and coordinating Notices to Airmen (Notams) were also initially identified.  The Federal Aviation Administration has taken timely action in response to these problems.  We are holding Lockheed Martin accountable for meeting the requirements of the contract.  Lockheed Martin has and continues to execute a corrective action plan that outlines the steps to be taken in each of these areas and is attacking these problems aggressively. 

Let me briefly describe for you some of the oversight activities that the FAA has implemented to monitor Lockheed Martin in its implementation of the AFSS contract.

The FAA reviews recordings of air to ground radio and telephone communications between pilots and flight service personnel to validate performance data submitted by Lockheed Martin. FAA quality assurance evaluators perform site inspections at Lockheed Martin flight service stations.  Full facility evaluations are conducted by evaluators from the FAA Air Traffic Organization’s Safety and Evaluations Group. The National Weather Service examines pilot weather briefers and provides the results of the examinations to the FAA.  Within the QA program, the FAA has in place a group of 14 Quality Assurance Evaluators (QAEs) responsible for monitoring Lockheed Martin performance.  This is done through facility visits and phone audits.  Between 2006 and 2007, the QAEs have conducted 2,142 quality assurance calls to Lockheed Martin facilities, completing 1201 in 2006 and 940 year-to-date in 2007.  By the end of 2007, the QAEs will have also completed 66 facility visits over the past two years, with 38 in 2006 and 28 (22 completed and 6 left to do) in 2007.

The FAA has received and filed a number of complaints regarding the service of Lockheed Martin under the AFSS contract. During the time period of July 23, 2007 to September 30, 2007, a total of 1150 complaints were filed over the phone and through the web covering Lockheed Martin’s services in the following areas: Pilot Briefings, Flight Plans, Clearances, Weather Reporting Data, NOTAMs and In-Flight/Flight Watch.

The two most common complaints heard from GA pilots have been long call wait times and dropped flight plans.  FAA is working with Lockheed Martin to fix these problems, and Lockheed Martin has taken a number of steps to reduce or eliminate the problems.

Dropped calls and long call wait times, impact the ability to obtain weather briefings and clearance delivery requests prior to flying and close out or cancel flight plans once completed.  Dropped calls and long wait times for pilot weather briefings is frustrating and inconvenient; however, the aircraft has not yet departed and is still assimilating information and planning the flight, and therefore is not in jeopardy.  Dropped calls and long call wait times for flight plan cancellation/closures can result in airspace being tied up and/or the unnecessary initiation of search and rescue operations. 

Dropped calls and long call wait times for clearance requests could affect safety if a pilot chooses to depart in undesirable conditions without a flight plan or briefing.  The primary impact is inconvenience to the pilots and their customers, economic impact of unnecessarily burning fuel and possibly having to refuel, and a possible increase in workload for the terminal or enroute controller. 

Software changes were implemented on May 18, and July 19, 2007 that have significantly decreased the number of abandoned calls.  The abandoned call rate reached a peak during the week of May 6^th, 2007 at 29.5% and for the week ending September 30 it was 3.4%.  The contractually required APL is 7% or less for abandoned calls.  Ongoing analysis to determine if additional updates/corrective actions are required continues.

Call hold times have also decreased over the past several weeks.  While pilots may still experience longer waits during peak periods, the average call wait time is now consistently below forty-five seconds, down from the peak times experienced in mid-May of approximately eight minutes.  Lockheed Martin has rehired employees to supplement staffing during transition and adjusts staffing to meet the call volume by day and hour of the day. Fifteen facilities have reopened, providing additional resources to help meet the workload.  All but two facilities have consolidated allowing specialists to become more familiar with FS21 resulting in decreased call handle times.

Dropped flight plans present more of a technology problem than a staffing problem.  Lockheed Martin made several software changes to FS21 including one that forces a specialist to select the type of flight.  This has reduced the number of errors specialists are making.  Also, as of July 5, 2007, the ARTCC Host computer have been adapted to respond to and process flight plans from FS21 addresses, further reducing the number of dropped or lost flight plans.  Another issue identified was FS21 addressing of flight plans with departure airports located near ARTCC boundaries.  In many cases, flight plans for those airports should be transmitted to ARTCCs other than the one the airport is geographically located in.  Lockheed Martin made an adaptation change on September 10, 2007 for those airports.  This should resolve the majority of remaining lost flight plans. 

The FAA has been monitoring Lockheed Martin’s staffing levels throughout the facility consolidation.  As of September 10, 2007 operational staffing was 842 full performance level specialists.  This decrease in staffing from the October 4, 2005 level of 1650 is due to normal attrition as well as Lockheed Martin’s facility consolidation plan.  While Lockheed Martin has taken some steps to manage staffing fluctuations, including increased hiring of developmental specialists, use of temporary employees, and extensive use of overtime, the FAA is concerned with ensuring Lockheed Martin maintain operational staffing levels capable of meeting current and forecasted demand for services.  To this end, the FAA and Lockheed Martin have engaged in a management effort to establish metrics and take appropriate actions.  This approach will support more refined and appropriate staffing levels for future operations.

Dependent upon Lockheed Martin’s meeting of an Accepted Level of Performance (APL), they receive a financial award or a credit from the FAA, unless a Lockheed Martin Corrective Action Plan is accepted in lieu of a credit.  A quarterly, executive-level Board of Performance and Cost Review (BCPR) meeting provides a venue for the performance evaluation discussion with representation from both Lockheed Martin and FAA.  Thus far, the FAA has levied $9.7 million in financial penalties for performance in FY 2006 and the first two quarters of FY 2007 in cases where Acceptable Performance Levels (APLs) were not met.  In FY 2006 and the first two quarters of FY 2007, awards totaling $6.0 million were offered by the FAA in cases where Lockheed Martin met or exceeded the APLs.

Actions taken by the FAA and Lockheed Martin are showing results.  Complaints received by Lockheed Martin have dropped off sharply, from a high of 326 the week ending May 13 down to 99 the week ending September 30 – a decline of more than 69 percent.  FAA believes that continuing to monitor Lockheed Martin operational performance through FAA-internal evaluations, external evaluations by the Office of Inspector General, validation of Lockheed Martin evaluations, feedback from AOPA and the FAA complaint process, and holding Lockheed Martin accountable to performance with monetary credits and awards tied to 21 metrics defining quality service, will yield the results we sought to achieve when awarding the AFSS contract.

The AFSS Program is on track to achieve its estimated $2.2 billion savings and cost avoidance in capital and labor over a 13-year period.  Although transition costs at the beginning of the contract have varied or shifted, the FAA continues to be on track toward achieving its originally estimated savings and cost avoidance.

The Congress provided the FAA with the authority – through the ATO – to operate more like a business.  FAA is doing so through this performance-based contract with Lockheed Martin to operate the FSS system.  We are conducting appropriate oversight; we know about the problems through our own monitoring and audits, and through complaints from AOPA and directly to the FAA complaint line; and we are taking appropriate actions under the contract.  FAA is also working with Lockheed Martin to fix the problems, so that together we can provide the proper service to the customer.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, the FAA believes that through its oversight of the contract, and through working with Lockheed Martin and AOPA to address and remedy the identified service problems and delays, we will be able to achieve the safe and efficient AFSS system envisioned when the contract was awarded to Lockheed Martin, while realizing the cost savings to the taxpayer that validate the decision to contract for these services through a performance based contract vehicle. 

I thank the Subcommittee for the opportunity to discuss this important issue.  This concludes my testimony, and I would be happy to answer any questions.

Statement of

Linda J. Washington,
Acting Assistant Secretary for Administration
Office of the Secretary
United States Department of Transportation (DOT)

Hearing on

The Transit Benefit Program

Before

Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations
Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
United States Senate

April 24, 2007

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Coleman, and members of the Subcommittee for the opportunity to testify today on the Department of Transportation’s role in implementing the Federal Transit Benefit Program.  My statement today will address both the Department’s own participation in the transit benefit program as a Federal agency and its role as the home agency for TRANServe, the organization utilized by 108 Federal entities nationwide to obtain and manage the distribution of transit benefit fare media. 

Reducing Highway Congestion is a Priority for DOT

According to its 2003 study of 85 urban areas in the US, the Texas Transportation Institute estimated that highway congestion is imposing a high cost on the national economy.  The study estimated that highway congestion causes 3.7 billion hours of travel delays and potentially wastes $63 billion per year.  For example, in the 10 most congested areas, which include the National Capital Region, congestion has been estimated to cost individual commuters between $850 and $1,600 in lost time and fuel each year.  To address this growing concern, last May, the Department of Transportation announced the Bush Administration’s National Strategy to Reduce Congestion on America’s Transportation Network, a comprehensive new national initiative to reduce congestion across our entire transportation system.  Increasing transit ridership nationwide is an important component of the National Strategy for reducing congestion. The Transit Benefit program is a proven means to help increase the use of mass transit.

Background on the Transit Benefit Program

The program was established in 1991 when the Department’s Federal Transit Administration (FTA) began pilot testing a transit benefit program, which provided up to $21 per month in transit fare media to its employees.  The Energy Policy Act of 1992 raised the monthly tax-free limit to $60 and linked the limit to changes in the Consumer Price Index.  The Federal Employees Clean Air Incentive Act, signed into law in 1993, permanently authorized Federal participation in this program, resulting in its expansion throughout the Department of Transportation and other Federal agencies.  In April 2000, President Clinton signed Executive Order 13150, which sought to reduce Federal employees’ contribution to traffic congestion and air pollution and expand their commuting alternatives.  The executive order called upon DOT, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Department of Energy to implement a nationwide pilot program, and ascertain its effectiveness in reducing single occupancy vehicle travel and local area traffic congestion.  In a 2003 final report to the Office of Management and Budget, DOT reported that the interagency group found transit benefits to be successful in reducing Federal employees’ contribution to traffic congestion and air pollution, and expanding their commuting alternatives. The report estimated that the transit benefit program resulted in over 15,000 fewer single occupancy vehicles on the roads of the National Capital Region, saving over 8 million gallons of gasoline, and eliminating emissions of almost 40,000 tons of carbon dioxide from the air, as well as reducing other tailpipe emissions.  In 2005, the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient, Transportation Equity Act:  A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU) required Federal agencies to implement transit benefit programs for all eligible employees in the National Capital Region.

Today, participation in the transit benefit program has increased considerably, and its impact on the National Capital Region, in terms of congestion mitigation and air quality has grown.  The transit benefit program’s importance is particularly evident when considering specific transportation alternatives in the National Capital Region.  For example, the Virginia Railway Express (VRE), a growing commuter railroad serving the National Capital Region relies on transit benefits for about 65 percent of its revenues.   With FY 2006 average daily ridership of nearly 15,000 people, Federal employees’ transit benefits used on VRE alone are responsible for removing a significant number of motor vehicles off the highly-congested I-95 and I-66 corridors in Virginia.   

Overall the Federal transit benefit program now has extensive participation in the National Capital Region.  Benefit recipients are eligible to receive a maximum of $110 of fare media per month, with the amount received dependent on their actual mass transit commuting costs.  Many of the Federal agencies offering the transit benefit program are utilizing the distribution services of the organization within DOT, known as TRANServe.

TRANServe Offers Transit Benefit Distribution Services

As the transit benefit program took shape in its early years, the Department of Transportation decided that it would be most efficient to centralize the distribution services for its operating administrations, rather than replicate the resources necessary to obtain and safeguard fare media, and manage the distribution program.  This organization has evolved over the years, to offer transit benefit distribution services nationwide, to organizations throughout the Federal government.  It now distributes over $200 million in cash equivalent fare media annually, servicing over 233,000 participants employed by 108 Federal organizations nationwide.  Within the National Capital Region, during FY 2006, this organization distributed about $102 million in Federal transit benefits to 81 Federal employer organizations and over 106,000 Federal employees.

From the perspective of providing an efficient, economical means to distribute transit benefits, TRANServe enables agencies to make use of a single established distribution system, with extensive and effective internal controls over the receipt, maintenance, and distribution of the fare media provided to Federal employees under the program.  It eliminates the need to establish multiple systems duplicating these functions at agencies and individual offices throughout the country.  It also offers some unique advantages due to its size and experience.  For example, transit operators in some localities offer discounts for volume purchases of fare media, and these savings are then passed on to the participating agencies.  There is no mandate to make use of TRANServe for transit benefit distribution, rather, each of the agencies now making use of its services, including the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and the US House of Representatives, decided it was in their interest to use TRANServe for transit benefit distribution.  Participating agencies, TRANServe, and transit benefit recipients all have specific responsibilities to help ensure that the transit benefit program functions effectively and that individuals participating in the program receive only the fare media they are eligible for, and use it appropriately.

Participating Agency and TRANServe Responsibilities

TRANServe enters into a customer agreement with each of the Federal entities it services.  A sample customer agreement is shown in Attachment 1.  The customer agreement specifically states that TRANServe will order, purchase, verify, maintain, and safeguard fare media prior to disbursing them to participants, and shall have full responsibility for any fare media that is in its possession prior to disbursement.  It also states that it is the responsibility of the Customer (i.e., the participating Federal entity) to verify the eligibility of its employees to receive the transit benefits.  This means that participating agencies are responsible for identifying, determining the amount of eligibility, and overseeing the participation of their employees in the transit benefit program.  Agency and TRANServe responsibilities are further reinforced in the monthly activity statements provided to TRANServe customers, a sample of which is included in Attachment 2.  The key point is that TRANServe is only a distribution agent for providing the fare media.  Its role in distributing transit fare media is analogous to the role of the four Federal payroll centers and agencies throughout the Federal government.  In both cases, the servicing organizations use data provided by agencies to make disbursements, while the customer agency remains responsible for its internal controls over its employees’ eligibility and the amount each receives.

DOT’s Implementation of the Transit Benefit Program

Inasmuch as the Department of Transportation is both a participant in the transit benefit program and home to the TRANServe organization, we are seeking to maintain a program with extensive participation and use of mass transit, in line with our strategic goals for congestion reduction, while having effective and useful controls in place to ensure the program accomplishes its intended results.  Each time a transit benefit recipient receives his or her fare media, the recipient is required to sign for it.  On the form, there is an explanation of general requirements for continued participation in the program and recipient responsibility.  Because recipients may not take the time to read the requirements on the signature form, in August 2006, TRANServe produced, and began distributing to DOT recipients, the plain language reminder reproduced in Attachment 3 to this testimony.  With this action, TRANServe was seeking to help ensure that transit benefit recipients are fully aware of the requirements associated with their receipt and use of the fare media.  TRANServe has also been seeking agreement from the agencies it services to provide the plain language reminder to their recipients, each time fare media is distributed.  Thus far it has gained written agreement from 14 agencies who have agreed to use the plain language reminder.

DOT also believes that it is important to have current accurate information on transit benefit recipient commuting costs, and last year initiated the first round of what is now an annual recertification requirement.  In order for DOT employees to continue receiving transit benefits, they must recertify each year.  Finally, to reduce program costs and further improve internal controls, DOT is moving to require all of its employees in the National Capital Region that receive transit benefits and use only the Metro system to commute to work, to transition to the use of SmartCards®.  These cards enable users to download monthly benefits directly from Metro FareCard machines onto permanent cards equipped with special microchips.  TRANServe expects to achieve significant reductions in its inventory needs and program costs, once the SmartCard® is fully implemented.  These SmartCards® also include a reminder on the back that transit benefits downloaded to the cards are only for employees’ commute to work.

Making the System Work Better

Mr. Chairman, we recognize that it is in the best interest of the Federal government, the taxpayer, and commuters in general to make the transit benefit program work as effectively as possible.  We are here today to express our commitment to the program and to gain additional insight from this Committee and the GAO that could help to make it work better.  We have been coordinating with GAO in the ongoing investigation, and we are concerned by the results we understand the GAO will be reporting here today.  As a result, we are working to ensure the Department of Transportation is prepared to take swift and appropriate action to address any instances of wrongdoing by DOT’s benefit recipients.  Furthermore, we have initially identified three areas that could benefit from improvements -- participant education, internal controls, and administrative remedies.  I would like to take a moment to discuss each of these areas and identify actions that are already underway.

Participant Education

Preliminary indications from GAO relating to its ongoing investigation show that some of the issues it has identified may be due to program participants who are not fully aware of their responsibilities under the transit benefit program.  There are a number of actions now underway to address these issues.  First, to ensure that there is no misunderstanding by participating agencies with regard to their role in the program, TRANServe is preparing to update all customer agreements to more extensively delineate the services provided by TRANServe, and those responsibilities that remain with the customer agency. 

To better educate transit benefit recipients, TRANServe will continue to distribute the plain language written explanation of responsibilities and requirements.  It intends to make use of them at all distribution points, and expand acceptance to all its customers in the near future.  TRANServe is also considering new means to convey this message, and is now experimenting with printing the warning on small envelopes, and inserting the fare media in the envelopes, so that the message stays with the fare media.

TRANServe is also developing an electronic learning package that would be implemented through the electronic Learning Management System or eLMS.  This package will initially be pilot tested with DOT employees and will reemphasize recipient responsibilities, identify prohibited practices such as unauthorized use by ineligible employees and inappropriate transfer of fare media.  It will also enumerate the potential penalties associated with inappropriate actions, which range from admonishment through dismissal depending on the circumstances.  We are working to incorporate this tutorial through eLMS into DOT’s on-line annual recertification process, so that it will be necessary for recipients to complete the training course each year, before recertification can occur.

Internal Controls

TRANServe recognizes that the fare media it distributes is a cash equivalent and has an extensive system of internal controls that provide oversight for inventory maintenance and distribution activities.  This system has been independently reviewed by security experts and auditors.  TRANServe uses various types of internal controls that range from weekly independent inventory counts to full quarterly audits to ensure effective inventory control.  Recently, TRANServe created an Internal Controls Officer position which is specifically responsible for monitoring and reviewing the organization’s internal controls and ensuring that all requirements are effectively fulfilled.  In addition, the Internal Controls Officer will design related training classes and materials to serve as a resource for training TRANServe employees and DOT transit benefit participants.  These training materials will be offered as a recommended resource to Federal entities using TRANServe 

Administrative Remedies

We believe that the vast majority of Federal employees who participate in the program do so honestly, responsibly, and with integrity.  With the implementation and increasing deployment of TRANServe’s efforts to ensure program participants are aware of the restrictions on obtaining, and using the benefits provided, it is our hope to eliminate any inappropriate use of the fare media.  However, we recognize that there may be individuals intent on using the system for their own personal gain at taxpayers’ expense.  We at DOT are prepared to deal firmly and expediently with any individual found to be intentionally deceptive in obtaining more benefits than they are due, using them inappropriately, or selling the fare media.   We await the final results of GAO’s investigation, and any subsequent investigation undertaken by DOT’s Office of Inspector General, to determine whether there have been any instances of misuse or misstatements made by DOT participants in the Transit Benefit Program. DOT will take fast, appropriate, and meaningful action to address any wrongdoing identified.  I have already met with representatives from DOT’s Office of Human Resources and our Office of General Counsel to discuss appropriate administrative penalties for proven instances of misuse and have instructed them to act swiftly and decisively.

Conclusion

The Federal Transit Benefit program is an important tool to help address the congestion and air pollution issues affecting the National Capital Region and cities across the Nation. When implemented properly, it helps to get commuters out of their single occupancy vehicles and onto mass transit, saving fuel while reducing congestion and air pollution.  DOT is pleased to make its TRANServe organization available to other Federal agencies, to provide them with an effective and efficient means to distribute transit benefits to their eligible employees.  At the same time, DOT is dismayed to learn that some employees through either ignorance or avarice have made inappropriate use of the privilege afforded by the transit benefit program.  As described above, TRANServe is already working to help ensure the program serves its intended purpose.  We also stand ready to work with your committee to take all appropriate measures, within our authority, to make sure this program works as intended for the American people.

I would be happy to answer any questions the committee may have.

Attachment 1 – Sample TRANServe Customer Agreement (Highlight Added)

PARITIES TO THE AGREEMENT

OST FORM VER 1.9 WKAUTH9.FRP for Form Flow 1.1 (26 SEP 96) w/Customer Agreement

Attachment 2 – Sample TRANServe Account Activity Statement (Highlight Added)

Attachment 3 – Sample TRANServe Participant Reminder

STATEMENT OF

ROBERT A. STURGELL,
ACTING ADMINISTRATOR,
FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION,
AND
THE HONORABLE D.J. GRIBBIN,
GENERAL COUNSEL,
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION,

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION,
SUBCOMMITTEE ON AVIATION OPERATIONS, SAFETY, AND SECURITY,

ON

CONGESTION AND DELAYS:  THE IMPACT ON TRAVELERS AND POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS,

ON

SEPTEMBER 27, 2007.

Chairman Rockefeller, Senator Lott, Members of the Subcommittee: 

Thank you for holding today’s hearing on airline delays and consumer issues.  We are now coming to the end of the peak summer travel season.  We appreciate having the opportunity to assess how our aviation system performed and to describe the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) efforts to reduce congestion and delays in our nation’s aviation system.  Growing congestion and delays in the system are a serious threat to the U.S. economy and our quality of life.  Successfully addressing this threat will require us to embrace new solutions and acknowledge that pursuit of status quo policies will do little, if anything, to reverse the substantial decline in system performance that we have experienced in recent years. 

This is precisely why the Administration has proposed to overhaul the way we pay for and manage our air traffic control system and to allow airports new flexibilities to embrace market-based pricing mechanisms at heavily congested airports.  The prices that system users pay to fly in the United States do not currently reflect the true costs of flying.  As a result, the current FAA and airport financing structure actually provides an incentive for more congestion.  This is clearly not a sustainable approach.  

As we frame the problem, we should note that we are living in the safest period in aviation history and we are constantly striving to make it safer still.  In the past 10 years, the commercial fatal accident rate has dropped 57%.  In the past three years, the United States averaged approximately two fatal accidents per year and 28 deaths per year; while any loss of life is tragic, this statistic is remarkable, given that there are well over 100,000 aircraft operations per day.  General aviation accidents are down.  Air traffic control errors are occurring at a rate lower than in the previous two years.  Safety is and will always be the primary goal of the FAA.  Nothing we do to address congestion and delays will ever compromise our safety mandate.

Still, it is no secret that while we are enjoying a record level of safety, we are at a critical point with congestion and delays.  This past summer, we saw record delays in flights across the country.  From October 2006 to August 2007, delays are up almost 20%, compared with the same time period from 2005-06.  Eighteen of our nation’s largest airports have returned to their highest pre-9/11 commercial passenger levels.  This past summer, we saw 7,936,885 minutes in delays throughout the system.  Of that, 44% occurred in the New York/New Jersey/Philadelphia region.  Our aviation system is stretched to the limit.  As we currently address the problem with new technologies and procedures, the FAA has, as you know, a long-term plan to address congestion and delays – the Next Generation Air Transportation System (or NextGen) will transform the aviation system and how we control air traffic.  We must be able to handle the demands of the future for aviation travel – projected to be one billion passengers by 2015. 

NextGen is a steady, deliberate, and highly collaborative undertaking, which focuses on leveraging our latest technologies, such as satellite-based navigation, surveillance and network-centric systems.  It is designed to be flexible to take advantage of even newer and better technologies as they become available.  Ten years ago, no one could have conceived of carrying thousands of songs in your pocket or being able to send emails using a PDA thumbboard.  Nevertheless, those technologies are available and they have revolutionized the way many Americans live their lives.  We want to make sure that our air transportation system can accommodate innovations without becoming entrenched in technology that is new today but obsolete tomorrow.  But NextGen is not a “plug and play” system that can be dropped in place in 2025; we have already begun putting pieces of it in place – pieces that begin to lay the foundation of the solution to our record delays.  In our testimony today, we would like to outline some of the near-term and long-term solutions that the FAA and its partners have in store to relieve the pressure of congestion and delays. 

Aviation is one of the most complex industries in that world, consisting of an extremely intricate web of infrastructure, technology, and people.  No one piece of today’s aviation system can stand alone.  We are all in this together, and we look forward to continuing our partnerships with the airport, airline, and business/general aviation communities to ensure that their pieces of their parts of the solution come together to help solve the problem as well.

NextGen Solutions

While the completion of NextGen is the long-term solution to transforming the air transportation system, the FAA is tackling congestion with many near-term initiatives.  With the recent award to ITT of the ADS-B contract, our even more recently announced Airspace Redesign for New York/New Jersey/Philadelphia, several other new ATC procedures, and airport infrastructure projects, the FAA is well on its way to implementing the earliest pieces of NextGen to increase efficiency and reduce delays.

We would like to describe some of the key steps that we have recently taken or will be taking in the next few years to reduce delays:

NY/NJ/PHL Airspace Redesign:

The old, inefficient airspace routes and procedures pieced together over the past several decades were overdue to be reconfigured to make them more efficient and less complicated.  In addition to more jet routes with increased and better access, the Airspace Redesign includes improved use of available runways, fanned headings for departures and parallel arrivals, and more flexibility to manage delays in severe weather.  We project that under the Airspace Redesign, delays will be cut by 200,000 hours annually.  This is the single greatest improvement to address congestion we see in the near future for the New York/New Jersey metropolitan area. 

We also project that this will save $248 million annually in operating costs for airlines.  Additionally, the increased flexibility during severe weather is projected to save another $37 million annually.  Finally, the environmental advantages include reduced carbon dioxide emissions of a projected 430 million pounds per year, and the residents affected by aviation noise will be reduced by more than 600,000.  These are impressive gains.

Florida Airspace Redesign: 

To emphasize how our redesign efforts save us time and money, our recent Florida Airspace Redesign has proven very successful in addressing delays.  In October 2005, the FAA implemented the Florida Airspace Optimization (FAO), a series of airspace modifications that included:

• New sectors in Washington Center (ZDC) and Miami Center (ZMA) to reduce and redistribute controller workload;
• New overwater routes to increase north-south capacity; and
• New RNAV and conventional Standard Terminal Arrival Routes (STARS) to eliminate complex crosses and merges into Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport (FLL), Miami International Airport (MIA), Palm Beach International Airport (PBI), and other airports in South Florida.

FAA calculates that in its first year, the redesign has reduced delays, reduced reroutes, and reduced foreign fees attributable to reroutes in the amount of $22.5 million for traffic inbound to South Florida and $11.7 million for traffic outbound from South Florida.  In the Caribbean, a savings of $400,000 has been realized due to reduced reroutes and international user fees.  The benefits of the FAO total almost $35 million annually. 

RNAV/RNP: 

The FAA is currently expanding the use of procedures like Area Navigation (RNAV) and Required Navigation Performance (RNP), which collectively result in improved safety, access, capacity, predictability, and operational efficiency, as well as reduced environmental impacts.  RNAV operations remove the requirement for a direct link between aircraft navigation and a ground-based navigational aid (i.e. flying only from radar beacon to radar beacon), thereby allowing aircraft greater access to better routes and permitting flexibility of point-to-point operations.  By using more precise routes for take-offs and landings, RNAV enables reductions in fuel burn and emissions and increases in capacity. 

RNP is RNAV with the addition of an onboard monitoring and alerting function.  This onboard capability enhances the pilot’s situational awareness providing greater access to airports in challenging terrain.  RNP takes advantage of an airplane’s onboard navigation capability to fly a more precise flight path into an airport.  It increases access during marginal weather, thereby reducing diversions to alternate airports.  RNP has the effect of reducing the overall noise footprint and aggregate emissions.

In April 2005, we added 7 new RNAV departure fixes at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and 16 new RNAV procedures were added this past summer at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.  These procedures can be implemented quickly and with less coordination between pilot and air traffic control when a normal departure route is temporarily unavailable because of weather or other cause.  This saves time for the controllers and pilots, as well as fuel for the airlines that are equipped to use these procedures.  We now have well over 100 RNAV procedures in place throughout the NAS, and are planning to roll out more where we can.

Ground Delay (GDP) and Airspace Flow Programs (AFP): 

These are programs that help FAA traffic managers distribute delays equally among the relevant flights and enables us to safely meter the rate that traffic arrives at an affected airport or flies through the affected area.  A GDP, implemented for a particular destination airport, controls flights destined for that airport by adjusting their departure times.  AFPs can be thought of as GDPs in the air.  Rather than delaying flights headed to a particular airport, an AFP controls flights routed through a specific section of airspace.  An AFP will only impact flights through the airspace that is constrained.  AFPs also provide a much more evenly distributed solution for customers.  Instead of the large airlines absorbing all of the delays caused by severe weather, general aviation aircraft will be constrained by AFPs if their routes happen to take them through affected areas.

Flight Schedule Monitor, Flight Schedule Analyzer, and Route Management Tool: 

Flight Schedule Monitor (FSM) creates a common situational awareness among all users and service providers in the National Airspace System (NAS).  All parties need to be aware of NAS constraints in order to make collaborative air traffic decisions.  FSM presents a graphical and timeline presentation of airport/airspace demand and capacity information and helps analyze and manage ground delay program/airspace flow programs so users can react quickly to NAS constraints.

Flight Schedule Analyzer (FSA) is a tool developed to explore the effectiveness of GDPs and to identify problems in the used in the Collaborative Decision Making (CDM) process.  It is primarily an analysis tool.

Route Management Tool (RMT) facilitates increased information exchange between air traffic control and the airline user community.  RMT is a query tool that allows users to search for, modify, and view centralized route databases and reference tables.

Traffic Management Advisor: 

The Traffic Management Advisor helps controllers sequence aircraft through en route airspace into major terminals.  TMA calculates a specific time for each aircraft to cross a fixed point in the airport landing route that also considers minimum safe distances between aircraft.  Appropriate direction to pilots is then provided using that data, allowing arrival streams that take better advantage of available landing slots.  The FAA estimates that when this Time-Based Metering is used, there are increases in arrival rates of 3 percent or more.  TMA is operational at all air route traffic control centers. 

Adaptive Compression: 

This is a computer program that automatically identifies slots that might go unused and moves other flights into those slots.  We can minimize unnecessary delays, and with fewer slots going unused, maximize capacity.

Controller staffing: 

The FAA understands how critical it is to have an adequately staffed and expertly trained air traffic controller workforce.  That is why we developed a comprehensive Controller Workforce Plan to address the wave of retirement-eligible controllers over the next ten years.  We have taken proactive steps to ensure we have the right people, at the right place and time.  To that end, we are expanding our Collegiate Training Initiative, and we have held numerous job fairs, and streamlined security and medical clearance processes.  We hired over 1,100 controllers last year, are hiring 1,700 this year, and plan to hire numbers consistent with the Controller Workforce Plan over next 10 years.

With regard to performance, as noted at the outset, safety is always our top priority.  We are meeting our targets for both reducing operational errors and runway incursions, which are down year-over-year.  Controller “time on position” (the time a controller actually spends controlling air traffic) system-wide is running about 4 hours and 30 minutes for an 8-hour workday.  System overtime is at 1.1 percent, which is below previous years, and total operations per controller are roughly the same as 1999 and 2000.

Airports: 

Since 2000, 13 new runways have opened at the 35 Operational Evolution Partnership (OEP) airports.  These 13 new runways encompass more than 20 miles of new runway pavement, and provide the airports with the potential to accommodate 1.6 million more annual operations.  This added capacity and decreased average delay per operation at these airports by 5 minutes.  In addition, about 6 months ago, an end-around taxiway was commissioned at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, the busiest airport in the United States.  This provides an alternative to having aircraft cross an active runway and will eliminate 612 runway crossings per day.

Currently, eight OEP Airports have airfield projects (3 new runways, 2 airfield reconfigurations, 1 runway extension, 1 end around taxiway, and 1 centerfield taxiway) under construction.  These projects will be commissioned by 2010 providing these airports with the potential to accommodate about 400,000 more annual operations, decrease average delay per operation by almost 2 minutes, and significantly reducing runway crossings. 

Ten other projects (3 airfield reconfigurations, 3 runway extensions, and 4 new runways) are in the planning or environmental stage at OEP airports through 2017.  In addition, seven communities have planning or environmental studies underway to examine how their metropolitan area will accommodate future demand for aviation.  Two communities have environmental processes underway for new airports.

Additionally, we have an initiative to direct Airport Improvement Program funds for enhancements at other high activity airports located within congested metropolitan areas that will improve each metropolitan area’s ability to accommodate future aviation demand efficiently.  We are also continually seeking ways to strengthen our environmental stewardship as we increase capacity at airports, by developing better systems, technologies, and analytical tools to evaluate aircraft noise and emissions.

The Future Airport Capacity Task (FACT) 2, an FAA study which was recently released, considered the impact of growth in air travel through 2025.  Demand and operational capacity at 291 airports spanning 223 metropolitan areas across the country was evaluated.  Results indicate that by 2025, 14 airports and eight metropolitan areas will require additional capacity, even if planned improvements are built at airports throughout the system.  FACT 2 recommends various capacity improvements including:  new runways and new commercial service airports; additional studies to focus and determine appropriate regional solutions like the increased use of secondary airports; congestion management; and the continued development and implementation of NextGen.  FAA is starting to work with local communities and airports forecast to be capacity-constrained, including metropolitan regions on the east and west coast to develop plans to address the anticipated capacity issues in each of the targeted areas.

These are a few of the steps that we are taking to address congestion and delays.  Of course, as we develop and implement these programs and take these measures now to relieve delay in the short-term, we continue to look forward.  We cannot just put a Band-Aid® on the system; we have to build on this foundation now.

Consumer Concerns

At the Department of Transportation (DOT), we are not only dedicated to reducing congestion and resultant flight delays, but we are also, of course, committed to improving the treatment afforded air travelers by airlines during flight delays and, in particular lengthy on-ground delays.  Clearly, stranding passengers aboard aircraft for several hours simply is not acceptable and something must be done to minimize such incidents.  In this regard, we would like publicly to thank Inspector General Scovel and his staff for the excellent report issued this week.  Secretary Peters has directed the staff to carefully and thoroughly review the Inspector General’s recommendations as quickly as possible. 

While the Inspector General’s report is very important to us, we would like to add that we have not been idle while awaiting the results of his investigation of specific lengthy, on-ground delay incidents and the manner in which the industry handles flight irregularities in general.  Secretary Peters established a senior staff working group to examine the alternatives available to the DOT to address the consumer protection issue (as well as congestion) and it is well along in its consideration of various alternatives.  Thus, we expect to be able to include the Inspector General’s recommendations in our on-going deliberations.  The Department does have the authority necessary to act on matters involving the treatment of consumers through statutory provisions that prohibit carriers from engaging in unfair and deceptive practices (49 U.S.C. §41712) and require carriers to provide “safe and adequate” service (49 U.S.C. §41702).  With respect to deceptive practices, the Office of the Secretary’s Aviation Enforcement Office has for a number of months been investigating chronically delayed flights and compliance by airlines with the existing Department requirement that airline reservation agents provide consumers flight delay information upon request.  We intend to take whatever action is in the public interest to improve the current situation faced by consumers.

Partnerships in Problem-Solving

While the FAA and DOT are taking aggressive steps to reduce congestion and delays, we are not in this alone.  The airlines and other aircraft operators hold important pieces to the puzzle as well.  Specifically, the airlines sometimes schedule their flights in a way that pushes the system to capacity under even the best of conditions.  Understandably, these schedules are largely a response to market demand.  We encourage our friends in the airline industry to reassess their scheduling with an eye towards relieving some of the strain on the system.  The long-term savings in reduced delays and happier consumers are well worth it.  Airlines have voluntarily made these changes in the past, such as “de-peaking” schedules at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson and Dallas-Ft. Worth, and those changes produced smoother operations.

Also worth noting is that general aviation and business aviation use is up.  While new users and business models are critical to the growth of the system, the air traffic control system cannot accommodate every new proposed use without a system that matches our costs with the revenues being produced to pay for the system.  On a system-wide basis, our cost allocation found that general aviation drives about 16% of the costs of the air traffic control system, while only paying about 3% of the taxes, a situation that is unsustainable given the growth in GA flight time that we expect.  We believe that a fairer allocation of costs is necessary to sustain the system and allow it to grow. 

Reauthorization

This brings us to our final point, that Congress plays an enormous role in shaping a solution.  The Subcommittee has heard this before, but it bears repeating as we move to the final stages of this year’s reauthorization debate:  a cost-based funding structure is essential to transforming the aviation system.  Numerous bipartisan commissions have recommended cost-based funding for the FAA over the last two decades, and air traffic control providers in every other developed country have cost-based funding.  Failure to adopt a cost-based system here is unfair to our air travelers and will hinder the implementation of NextGen, and, for the first time in history, put the United States behind other countries that are moving towards the future of aviation. 

We need fresh thinking and fresh approaches, and we need them now.  There is little connection between what users pay for services and the costs they generate, and this detachment leads to distorted consumption of air traffic services, and ultimately congestion.  This is why the Administration developed a proposal that included provisions for cost based financing, the flexibility to charge congestions fees, and market-based congestion pilots at congested airports like LaGuardia.  We know the system is not cost-based from the results of the FAA’s most recent study.  Using comprehensive cost accounting and activity data, we put together the most detailed and transparent cost allocation ever done by FAA or, we believe, by any other air traffic control provider.

The Administration’s proposal is crafted to reform FAA’s financing system to better enable modernization and reduce congestion.  In its proposal, FAA would charge cost-based fees for terminal and en route airspace.  At large congested airports, FAA could vary this terminal fee based on the time of day and day of the week, to reduce delays and congestion.  The Administration’s proposal also includes market-based mechanisms (such as auctions or congestion pricing) to allocate takeoffs and landings.  This would be used at airports in which varying the cost-based terminal fee would not be sufficient to reduce congestion. 

The Members of this Subcommittee are well aware of the long-term challenges facing the FAA.  We appreciate your support of our programs, and the hard work and long hours you have put in towards reauthorizing the FAA’s programs.  We are at a crossroads in aviation history and the path we choose now will have ramifications for generations of air travelers to come.  We are eager to continue working with the Congress on the reauthorization process.

We have taken steps to reduce congestion and delays.  However, the system is still stretched to capacity and congestion and delays are still problems, and unless we change our approach now, things will only get worse.  We expect that by 2015, the system will be carrying one billion passengers per year.  International passenger traffic is expected to grow by 70% in that same timeframe.  If we don’t make changes to our system, our projections indicate that by 2014, we will see an increase in delays of over 60% than what we have today. 

We need NextGen.  We believe that we have a fairly strong consensus on that point.  We also need the cost-based financing reforms or market-based congestion programs, or we will not have the tools to get there in time to meet the demand.  We must seize the opportunity this year to deliver it with a cost-based and fair financing structure.

Mr. Chairman, that concludes our prepared statement.  We would be happy to answer any questions that you or the other Members of the Committee may have.

STATEMENT OF

ROBERT A. STURGELL,
ACTING ADMINISTRATOR,
FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION,
AND
THE HONORABLE D.J. GRIBBIN,
GENERAL COUNSEL,
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION,

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE,
SUBCOMMITTEE ON AVIATION,

ON

AIRLINE DELAYS AND CONSUMER ISSUES,

ON

SEPTEMBER 26, 2007.

Chairman Costello, Congressman Petri, Members of the Subcommittee: 

Thank you for holding today’s hearing on airline delays and consumer issues.  We are now coming to the end of the peak summer travel season.  We appreciate having the opportunity to assess how our aviation system performed and to describe the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) efforts to reduce congestion and delays in our nation’s aviation system.  Growing congestion and delays in our aviation system are a serious threat to the U.S. economy and our quality of life.  Successfully addressing this threat will require us to embrace new solutions and acknowledge that pursuit of status quo policies will do little, if anything, to reverse the substantial decline in system performance that we have experienced in recent years. 

This is precisely why the Administration has proposed to overhaul the way we pay for and manage our air traffic control system and to allow airports new flexibilities to embrace market-based pricing mechanisms at heavily congested airports.  The prices that system users pay to fly in the United States do not currently reflect the true costs of flying.  As a result, the current FAA and airport financing structure actually provides an incentive for more congestion.  This is clearly not a sustainable approach.  

As we frame the problem, we should note that we are living in the safest period in aviation history and we are constantly striving to make it safer still.  In the past 10 years, the commercial fatal accident rate has dropped 57%.  In the past three years, the United States averaged approximately two fatal accidents per year and 28 deaths per year; while any loss of life is tragic, this statistic is remarkable, given that there are well over 100,000 aircraft operations per day.  General aviation accidents are down.  Air traffic control errors are occurring at a rate lower than in the previous two years.  Safety is and will always be the primary goal of the FAA.  Nothing we do to address congestion and delays will ever compromise our safety mandate.

Still, it is no secret that while we are enjoying a record level of safety, we are at a critical point with congestion and delays.  This past summer, we saw record delays in flights across the country.  From October 2006 to August 2007, delays are up almost 20%, compared with the same time period from 2005-06.  Eighteen of our nation’s largest airports have returned to their highest pre-9/11 commercial passenger levels.  This past summer, we saw 7,936,885 minutes in delays throughout the system.  Of that, 44% occurred in the New York/New Jersey/Philadelphia region.  Our aviation system is stretched to the limit.  While we are addressing the delays issue with new technologies and procedures immediately, the FAA has, as you know, a long-term plan to address congestion and delays – the Next Generation Air Transportation System (or NextGen) will transform the aviation system and how we control air traffic.  We must be able to handle the demands of the future for aviation travel – projected to be one billion passengers by 2015. 

NextGen is a steady, deliberate, and highly collaborative undertaking, which focuses on leveraging our latest technologies, such as satellite-based navigation, surveillance and network-centric systems.  It is designed to be flexible to take advantage of even newer and better technologies as they become available.  Ten years ago, no one could have conceived of carrying thousands of songs in your pocket or being able to send emails using a PDA thumbboard.  Nevertheless, those technologies are available and they have revolutionized the way many Americans live their lives.  We want to make sure that our air transportation system can accommodate innovations without becoming entrenched in technology that is new today but obsolete tomorrow.  But NextGen is not a “plug and play” system that can be dropped in place in 2025; we have already begun putting pieces of it in place – pieces that begin to lay the corners of the puzzle that is the solution to our record delays.  In our testimony today, we would like to outline some of the near-term and long-term solutions that the FAA and its partners have in store to relieve the pressure of congestion and delays. 

Aviation is one of the most complex industries in that world, consisting of an extremely intricate web of infrastructure, technology, and people.  No one piece of today’s aviation system can stand alone.  We are all in this together, and we look forward to continuing our partnerships with the airport, airline, and business/general aviation communities to ensure that their pieces of their parts of the solution come together to help solve the problem as well.

NextGen Solutions

While the completion of NextGen is the long-term solution to transforming the air transportation system, the FAA is tackling congestion with many near-term initiatives.  With the recent award to ITT of the ADS-B contract, our even more recently announced Airspace Redesign for New York/New Jersey/Philadelphia, several other new ATC procedures, and airport infrastructure projects, the FAA is well on its way to implementing the earliest pieces of NextGen to increase efficiency and reduce delays.

We would like to describe some of the key steps that we have recently taken or will be taking in the next few years to reduce delays:

NY/NJ/PHL Airspace Redesign:

The old, inefficient airspace routes and procedures pieced together over the past several decades were overdue to be reconfigured to make them more efficient and less complicated.  In addition to more jet routes with increased and better access, the Airspace Redesign includes improved use of available runways, fanned headings for departures and parallel arrivals, and more flexibility to manage delays in severe weather.  We project that under the Airspace Redesign, delays will be cut by 200,000 hours annually.  This is the single greatest improvement to address congestion we see in the near future for the New York/New Jersey metropolitan area. 

We also project that this will save $248 million annually in operating costs for airlines.  Additionally, the increased flexibility during severe weather is projected to save another $37 million annually.  Finally, the environmental advantages include reduced carbon dioxide emissions of a projected 430 million pounds per year, and the residents affected by aviation noise will be reduced by more than 600,000.  These are impressive gains.

Florida Airspace Redesign: 

To emphasize how our redesign efforts save us time and money, our recent Florida Airspace Redesign has proven very successful in addressing delays.  In October 2005, the FAA implemented the Florida Airspace Optimization (FAO), a series of airspace modifications that included:

• New sectors in Washington Center (ZDC) and Miami Center (ZMA) to reduce and redistribute controller workload;
• New overwater routes to increase north-south capacity; and
• New RNAV and conventional Standard Terminal Arrival Routes (STARS) to eliminate complex crosses and merges into Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport (FLL), Miami International Airport (MIA), Palm Beach International Airport (PBI), and other airports in South Florida.

FAA calculates that in its first year, the redesign has reduced delays, reduced reroutes, and reduced foreign fees attributable to reroutes in the amount of $22.5 million for traffic inbound to South Florida and $11.7 million for traffic outbound from South Florida.  In the Caribbean, a savings of $400,000 has been realized due to reduced reroutes and international user fees.  The benefits of the FAO total almost $35 million annually. 

RNAV/RNP: 

The FAA is currently expanding the use of procedures like Area Navigation (RNAV) and Required Navigation Performance (RNP), which collectively result in improved safety, access, capacity, predictability, and operational efficiency, as well as reduced environmental impacts.  RNAV operations remove the requirement for a direct link between aircraft navigation and a ground-based navigational aid (i.e. flying only from radar beacon to radar beacon), thereby allowing aircraft greater access to better routes and permitting flexibility of point-to-point operations.  By using more precise routes for take-offs and landings, RNAV enables reductions in fuel burn and emissions and increases in capacity. 

RNP is RNAV with the addition of an onboard monitoring and alerting function.  This onboard capability enhances the pilot’s situational awareness providing greater access to airports in challenging terrain.  RNP takes advantage of an airplane’s onboard navigation capability to fly a more precise flight path into an airport.  It increases access during marginal weather, thereby reducing diversions to alternate airports.  RNP has the effect of reducing the overall noise footprint and aggregate emissions.

In April 2005, we added 7 new RNAV departure fixes at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and 16 new RNAV procedures were added this past summer at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.  These procedures can be implemented quickly and with less coordination between pilot and air traffic control when a normal departure route is temporarily unavailable because of weather or other cause.  This saves time for the controllers and pilots, as well as fuel for the airlines that are equipped to use these procedures.  We now have well over 100 RNAV procedures in place throughout the NAS, and are planning to roll out more where we can.

Ground Delay (GDP) and Airspace Flow Programs (AFP): 

These are programs that help FAA traffic managers distribute delays equally among the relevant flights and enables us to safely meter the rate that traffic arrives at an affected airport or flies through the affected area.  A GDP, implemented for a particular destination airport, controls flights destined for that airport by adjusting their departure times.  AFPs can be thought of as GDPs in the air.  Rather than delaying flights headed to a particular airport, an AFP controls flights routed through a specific section of airspace.  An AFP will only impact flights through the airspace that is constrained.  AFPs also provide a much more evenly distributed solution for customers.  Instead of the large airlines absorbing all of the delays caused by severe weather, general aviation aircraft will be constrained by AFPs if their routes happen to take them through affected areas.

Flight Schedule Monitor, Flight Schedule Analyzer, and Route Management Tool: 

Flight Schedule Monitor (FSM) creates a common situational awareness among all users and service providers in the National Airspace System (NAS).  All parties need to be aware of NAS constraints in order to make collaborative air traffic decisions.  FSM presents a graphical and timeline presentation of airport/airspace demand and capacity information and helps analyze and manage ground delay program/airspace flow programs so users can react quickly to NAS constraints.

Flight Schedule Analyzer (FSA) is a tool developed to explore the effectiveness of GDPs and to identify problems in the used in the Collaborative Decision Making (CDM) process.  It is primarily an analysis tool.

Route Management Tool (RMT) facilitates increased information exchange between air traffic control and the airline user community.  RMT is a query tool that allows users to search for, modify, and view centralized route databases and reference tables.

Traffic Management Advisor: 

The Traffic Management Advisor helps controllers sequence aircraft through en route airspace into major terminals.  TMA calculates a specific time for each aircraft to cross a fixed point in the airport landing route that also considers minimum safe distances between aircraft.  Appropriate direction to pilots is then provided using that data, allowing arrival streams that take better advantage of available landing slots.  The FAA estimates that when Time-Based Metering is used, there are increases in arrival rates of 3 percent or more.  TMA is operational at all air route traffic control centers. 

Adaptive Compression: 

This is a computer program that automatically identifies slots that might go unused and moves other flights into those slots.  We can minimize unnecessary delays, and with fewer slots going unused, maximize capacity.

Controller staffing: 

The FAA understands how critical it is to have an adequately staffed and expertly trained air traffic controller workforce.  That is why we developed a comprehensive Controller Workforce Plan to address the wave of retirement-eligible controllers over the next ten years.  We have taken proactive steps to ensure we have the right people, at the right place and time.  To that end, we are expanding our Collegiate Training Initiative, and we have held numerous job fairs, and streamlined security and medical clearance processes.  We hired over 1,100 controllers last year, are hiring 1,700 this year, and plan to hire numbers consistent with the Controller Workforce Plan over next 10 years.

With regard to performance, as noted at the outset, safety is always our top priority.  We are meeting our targets for both reducing operational errors and runway incursions, which are down year-over-year.  Controller “time on position” (the time a controller actually spends controlling air traffic) system-wide is running about 4 hours and 30 minutes for an 8-hour workday.  System overtime is at 1.1 percent, which is below previous years, and total operations per controller are roughly the same as 1999 and 2000.

Airports: 

Since 2000, 13 new runways have opened at the 35 Operational Evolution Partnership (OEP) airports.  These 13 new runways encompass more than 20 miles of new runway pavement, and provide the airports with the potential to accommodate 1.6 million more annual operations.  This added capacity and decreased average delay per operation at these airports by 5 minutes.  In addition, about 6 months ago, an end-around taxiway was commissioned at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, the busiest airport in the United States.  This provides an alternative to having aircraft cross an active runway and will eliminate 612 runway crossings per day.

Currently, eight OEP Airports have airfield projects (3 new runways, 2 airfield reconfigurations, 1 runway extension, 1 end around taxiway, and 1 centerfield taxiway) under construction.  These projects will be commissioned by 2010 providing these airports with the potential to accommodate about 400,000 more annual operations, decrease average delay per operation by almost 2 minutes, and significantly reducing runway crossings. 

Ten other projects (3 airfield reconfigurations, 3 runway extensions, and 4 new runways) are in the planning or environmental stage at OEP airports through 2017.  In addition, seven communities have planning or environmental studies underway to examine how their metropolitan area will accommodate future demand for aviation.  Two communities have environmental processes underway for new airports.

Additionally, we have an initiative to direct Airport Improvement Program funds for enhancements at other high activity airports located within congested metropolitan areas that will improve each metropolitan area’s ability to accommodate future aviation demand efficiently.  We are also continually seeking ways to strengthen our environmental stewardship as we increase capacity at airports, by developing better systems, technologies, and analytical tools to evaluate aircraft noise and emissions.

The Future Airport Capacity Task (FACT) 2, an FAA study which was recently released, considered the impact of growth in air travel through 2025.  Demand and operational capacity at 291 airports spanning 223 metropolitan areas across the country was evaluated.  Results indicate that by 2025, 14 airports and eight metropolitan areas will require additional capacity, even if planned improvements are built at airports throughout the system.  FACT 2 recommends various capacity improvements including:  new runways and new commercial service airports; additional studies to focus and determine appropriate regional solutions like the increased use of secondary airports; congestion management; and the continued development and implementation of NextGen.  FAA is starting to work with local communities and airports forecast to be capacity-constrained, including metropolitan regions on the east and west coast to develop plans to address the anticipated capacity issues in each of the targeted areas.

These are a few of the steps that we are taking to address congestion and delays.  Of course, as we develop and implement these programs and take these measures now to relieve delay in the short-term, we continue to look forward.  We cannot just put a Band-Aid® on the system; we have to build on this foundation now.

Consumer Concerns

We at the Department of Transportation (DOT) are not only dedicated to reducing congestion and resultant flight delays, but we are also, of course, committed to improving the treatment afforded air travelers by airlines during flight delays and, in particular lengthy on-ground delays.  Clearly, stranding passengers aboard aircraft for several hours simply is not acceptable and something must be done to minimize such incidents.  In this regard, we would like publicly to thank Inspector General Scovel and his staff for the excellent report issued this week.  Secretary Peters has directed the staff to carefully and thoroughly review the Inspector General’s recommendations as quickly as possible. 

While the Inspector General's report is very important to us, we would like to add that we have not been idle while awaiting the results of his investigation of specific lengthy, on-ground delay incidents and the manner in which the industry handles flight irregularities in general.  Secretary Peters established a senior staff working group to examine the alternatives available to the DOT to address the consumer protection issue (as well as congestion) and it is well along in its consideration of various alternatives.  Thus, we expect to be able to include the Inspector General’s recommendations in our on-going deliberations.  The Department does have the authority necessary to act on matters involving the treatment of consumers through statutory provisions that prohibit carriers from engaging in unfair and deceptive practices (49 U.S.C. 41712) and require carriers to provide “safe and adequate” service (49 U.S.C. 41702).  With respect to deceptive practices, the Office of the Secretary’s Aviation Enforcement Office has for a number of months been investigating chronically delayed flights and compliance by airlines with the existing Department requirement that airline reservation agents provide consumers flight delay information upon request.  We intend to take whatever action is in the public interest to improve the current situation faced by consumers.

Partnerships in Problem-Solving

While the FAA and DOT are taking aggressive steps to reduce congestion and delays, we are not in this alone.  The airlines and other aircraft operators hold important pieces to the puzzle as well.  Specifically, the airlines sometimes schedule their flights in a way that pushes the system to capacity under even the best of conditions.  Understandably, these schedules are largely a response to market demand.  We encourage our friends in the airline industry to reassess their scheduling with an eye towards relieving some of the strain on the system.  The long-term savings in reduced delays and happier consumers are well worth it.  Airlines have voluntarily made these changes in the past, such as “de-peaking” schedules at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson and Dallas-Ft. Worth, and those changes produced smoother operations.

Also worth noting is that general aviation and business aviation use is up.  While new users and business models are critical to the growth of the system, the air traffic control system cannot accommodate every new proposed use without a system that matches our costs with the revenues being produced to pay for the system.  On a system-wide basis, our cost allocation found that general aviation drives about 16% of the costs of the air traffic control system, while only paying about 3% of the taxes, a situation that is unsustainable given the growth in GA flight time that we expect.  We believe that a fairer allocation of costs is necessary to sustain the system and allow it to grow. 

Reauthorization

This brings us to our final point, that Congress plays an enormous role in shaping a solution.  The Subcommittee has heard this before, but it bears repeating as we move to the final stages of this year’s reauthorization debate:  a cost-based funding structure is essential to transforming the aviation system.  Numerous bipartisan commissions have recommended cost-based funding for the FAA over the last two decades, and air traffic control providers in every other developed country have cost-based funding.  Failure to adopt a cost-based system here is unfair to our air travelers and will hinder the implementation of NextGen, and, for the first time in history, put the United States behind other countries that are moving towards the future of aviation. 

We need fresh thinking and fresh approaches, and we need them now.  There is little connection between what users pay for services and the costs they generate, and this detachment leads to distorted consumption of air traffic services, and ultimately congestion.  This is why the Administration developed a proposal that included provisions for cost based financing, the flexibility to charge congestions fees, and market-based congestion pilots at congested airports like LaGuardia.  We know the system is not cost-based from the results of the FAA’s most recent study.  Using comprehensive cost accounting and activity data, we put together the most detailed and transparent cost allocation ever done by FAA or, we believe, by any other air traffic control provider.

The Administration’s proposal was crafted to reform FAA’s financing system to better enable modernization and reduce congestion.  In its proposal, FAA would charge cost-based fees for terminal and en route airspace.  At large congested airports, FAA could vary this terminal fee based on the time of day and day of the week, to reduce delays and congestion.  The Administration’s proposal also included market-based mechanisms (such as auctions or congestion pricing) to allocate takeoffs and landings.  This would be used at airports in which varying the cost-based terminal fee would not be sufficient to reduce congestion. 

The Members of this Subcommittee are well aware of the long-term challenges facing the FAA.  We appreciate your support of our programs, and the hard work and long hours you have put in towards reauthorizing the FAA’s programs.  We are at a crossroads in aviation history and the path we choose now will have ramifications for generations of air travelers to come.  We are eager to continue working with the Congress on the reauthorization process.

We have taken steps to reduce congestion and delays.  However, the system is still stretched to capacity and congestion and delays are still problems, and unless we change our approach now, things will only get worse.  We expect that by 2015, the system will be carrying one billion passengers per year.  International passenger traffic is expected to grow by 70% in that same timeframe.  If we don’t make changes to our system, our projections indicate that by 2014, we will see an increase in delays of over 60% than what we have today. 

We need NextGen.  We believe that we have a fairly strong consensus on that point.  We also need the cost-based financing reforms or market-based congestion programs, or we will not have the tools to get there in time to meet the demand.  We must seize the opportunity this year to deliver it with a cost-based and fair financing structure.

Mr. Chairman, that concludes our prepared statement.  We would be happy to answer any questions that you or the other Members of the Committee may have.

JOINT STATEMENT OF
ROBERT STURGELL,
DEPUTY ADMINISTRATOR,
FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION,
AND
CHARLES LEADER,
DIRECTOR,
JOINT PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT OFFICE,

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE,
SUBCOMMITTEE ON AVIATION

ON

THE FUTURE OF AIR TRAFFIC CONTROL MODERNIZATION

May 9, 2007

Good morning Chairman Costello, Congressman Petri, and Members of the Subcommittee.  I am Robert Sturgell, Deputy Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration, and interim Chief Operating Officer for the Air Traffic Organization.  With me is Charles Leader, Director of the multi-agency Joint Planning and Development Office (JPDO).   We thank you for the opportunity to testify today about modernization of FAA’s Air Traffic Control System (ATC), and the work we are doing to develop and deploy the Next Generation Air Transportation System (NextGen) while providing operational and safety enhancements that deliver benefits to our customers today.

Reforming FAA’s financing system will better enable the modernization of the FAA’s Air Traffic Control System and transformation to NextGen.  Congress mandated in Vision 100 the establishment of the Air Traffic Organization (ATO).  Since the establishment of the ATO in 2003, we have required air traffic leadership to establish metrics for performance.  These metrics are also reflected in our budget preparation and execution, and are based on the cost of doing business.  We need to continue these practices as we establish the financing of our current and future operations- based on actual costs and investment requirements that will translate to tangible benefits and increasing efficiency for our nation’s air transportation system.  The NextGen Financing Act of 2007, as proposed by the Administration, provides the necessary reforms to our financing to allow for a reliable funding stream as we continue on the path towards the implementation of the NextGen system.

And implementing that system is imperative.  Our nation's air transportation system has become a victim of its own success.  Administrator Blakey and the FAA have taken many steps to delay this gridlock.  Since FY 2000, 13 new runways have opened, and we’ve worked with operators—through forums like Growth Without Gridlock—to find ways to squeeze extra capacity from our system.  In addition, we’ve kept our modernization projects on schedule—2006 is the third straight year that we produced good results.  As we reported in our Flight Plan, in FY 2006, 100 percent of our critical acquisitions were within 10 percent of budget and 97.4 percent were on schedule.

To get to the future, we need to prepare now.  The actions of today are necessary for us to continue on a progressive path of solutions to address the current and future demands of the aviation industry and the flying public.

We have created the most effective, efficient and safest system in the world.   But we now face a serious and impending problem:  today’s system is at capacity.   While the industry downturn following the attacks of September 11 temporarily slowed the growth in the aviation industry that began in the late 1990's, demand is growing rapidly.   And we have to change if we a going to be ready to meet it.

Flight delays have increased each of the last three fiscal years, and cancellations remain at an unacceptable level.  Other issues, ranging from environmental concerns to the complexities of homeland security are placing additional stresses on the system.  A MITRE study done for FAA concludes that the current system cannot handle the projected traffic demands expected by 2015 – absent modernization.

NextGen is a steady, deliberate, and highly collaborative undertaking, aimed at the long-term transformation of our air transportation system.  It focuses on leveraging new technologies, such as satellite-based navigation, surveillance and network-centric systems.  The FAA is not waiting for 2025 to implement technologies to promote safer, more efficient operations, and increase capacity.  We are moving forward now with technologies and procedures which have two purposes;  one, to improve efficiency, increase capacity and reduce congestion in the present system; and, two, to provide the foundation to build upon for further improvements in NextGen.  The FAA is currently expanding the use of procedures like Area Navigation (RNAV) and Required Navigation Performance (RNP), which collectively result in improved safety, access, capacity, predictability, and operational efficiency, as well as reduced environmental impacts. 

RNAV operations remove the requirement for a direct link between aircraft navigation and a ground-based navigational aid, thereby allowing aircraft better access and permitting flexibility of point-to-point operations.  By using more precise routes for take-offs and landings, RNAV enables reductions in fuel burn and emissions and increases in capacity.  FAA is expanding the implementation of RNAV procedures to additional airports.  The FAA has authorized 128 RNAV procedures at 38 airports for FY2005 and FY2006.  We will publish at least 50 additional procedures in FY2007. 

An example of how we better use the airspace is our introduction of Domestic Reduce Vertical Separation Minimums (DRVSM) in 2005.  We reduced separation minimums from 2000 feet to 1000 feet, effectively doubling the high altitude airspace, and saving airlines close to $400 million per year in fuel.

Another FAA initiative is implementing Required Navigation Performance (RNP) on a greater scale.  RNP is RNAV with the addition of an onboard monitoring and alerting function.  This onboard capability enhances the pilot’s situational awareness providing greater access to airports in challenging terrain.  RNP takes advantage of an airplane’s onboard navigation capability to fly a more precise flight path into an airport.  It increases access during marginal weather, thereby reducing diversions to alternate airports.  RNP reduces the overall noise footprint and aggregate emissions.  The FAA has authorized a total of 40 RNP procedures at 18 airports.  We plan to publish at least 25 RNP approach procedures in FY2007.

Enabling any far-reaching, systematic and long-term transformation requires a vision of what you want and need to achieve, and plans for how to get there from here.  For NextGen, the Concept of Operations, the Enterprise Architecture, and the Integrated Work Plan provide us with that picture and the plans for how to achieve it.  We will be discussing the Concept of Operations, the Enterprise Architecture, and the Integrated Work Plan later in this statement.  We are setting the stage for the long-term development of an air transportation system that will be scalable to a growing demand and the need for safer and more flexible aviation business models.  It is a new approach to the way we view the future of the system, and it demands a new level of collaboration, planning and vision.

The unique structure of the NextGen initiative, setting up an inter-agency office to coordinate the efforts of the federal partners, while also bringing in the private sector as a full partner from the very beginning, will be instrumental in the success of NextGen.  Indeed, it is our expectation that this new structure will help us avoid some of the problems that FAA has experienced in previous modernization efforts. 

NextGen, while representing a continuum of research, investment and implementation activities, can be broken out into three major phases.  Each one represents a key period in NextGen’s development.  The first phase focuses on the development and implementation of certain key NextGen foundational technologies and capabilities.  These initiatives represent our current programs.  This phase also includes the essential research and development needed to support the next two phases.  The second phase builds upon this foundation to begin critical implementation of NextGen capabilities.  This is when many aircraft in the fleet will begin to operate using on-board NextGen tools.  This will allow greater expansion of RNP/RNAV procedures, net-enabled weather, advanced data communications, and the development of critical infrastructure for Trajectory-Based Operations.  The third phase will be maturation of our core NextGen capabilities into an operational nationwide system.  This will allow aviation services to be managed and operated in a way that achieves the NextGen transformation across the entire air transportation system.

FAA and JPDO are beginning to move from planning to implementation.  In fact, the FAA’s FY 2008 – 2012 Capital Investment Plan (CIP) includes $4.6 billion in projects and activities that directly support NextGen.  The CIP is a 5-year plan that describes the National Airspace System modernization costs aligned with the projects and activities that the Agency intends to accomplish during that time.  Several key NextGen technologies and programs have already been identified and are funded in the FAA’s FY08 budget request.  These technologies and programs are:  Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B); System Wide Information Management (SWIM); NextGen Data Communications; NextGen Network Enabled Weather; NAS Voice Switch; and, NextGen Demonstrations and Infrastructure Development.

These technologies are essential to begin the transition from today’s air traffic control system to the NextGen system of 2025.  One important transformational technology is Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast or ADS-B.  ADS-B is, quite simply, the future of air traffic control.  A key element of the NextGen system, it uses GPS satellite signals to provide air traffic controllers and pilots with much more accurate information on aircraft position that will help keep aircraft safely separated in the sky and on runways.  Aircraft transponders receive GPS signals and use them to determine the aircraft’s precise position in the sky, which is combined with other data and broadcast out to other aircraft and controllers.  When properly equipped with ADS-B, both pilots and controllers will, for the very first time, see the same real-time displays of air traffic, thereby substantially improving safety. 

ADS-B has been successfully demonstrated through the FAA’s Capstone program in Alaska, where GA accidents have been reduced by more than 40 percent for ADS-B equipped aircraft.  And UPS has been working with us on a demonstration program in Louisville using ADS-B to conduct continuous descent arrivals, where they have been able to reduce noise by 30 percent and emissions by 34 percent as a result.  One of the first uses of ADS-B technology outside of Alaska and Louisville will be in the Gulf of Mexico.  The FAA signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with the Helicopter Association International (HAI), helicopter operators, and oil and gas platform owners in the Gulf of Mexico to improve service in the Gulf.  Using ADS-B technology, helicopter operators will transmit critical position information to the Houston Center, enabling enhanced Air Traffic Control services in the Gulf.

The FAA is considering a rulemaking that would mandate the avionics necessary for implementing ADS-B in the national airspace system, and is working closely with stakeholders to determine a timeline.

In today’s NAS, there are a myriad of systems with custom-designed, developed, and managed connections.  The future, however, demands an infrastructure that is capable of flexible growth, and the cost of expanding today’s point-to-point system is simply prohibitive.  System Wide Information Management (SWIM) responds to that need.  As many major national and international corporations have done with their own technological systems, SWIM will provide for NextGen the infrastructure and services to deliver network-enabled information access across air transportation operations, and high quality, timely data to many users and applications.  By reducing the number and types of interfaces and systems, SWIM will better facilitate multi-agency information-sharing, eliminating redundant information and providing information where it is needed.  When implemented, the efficiencies provided by SWIM will contribute to expanded system capacity, improved predictability and operational decision-making, and reduced cost of service.  In addition, SWIM will improve coordination to allow transition from tactical conflict management to strategic trajectory-based operations.  It will also allow for better use of existing capacity en-route.   While transparent to the flying public, these are efficiencies that will benefit the consumer and the aviation industry.

The heart of the NextGen advanced airspace management concepts lies within the digital data communications infrastructure of the future.  In the current system, all air traffic communications with airborne aircraft is by voice communications.  NextGen transformation cannot be realized through today’s voice-only communications, especially in the areas of aircraft trajectory-based operations, net-centric and net-enabled information access.  Data communications enabled services, such as 4-D trajectories and conformance management, will shift air traffic operations from short-term, minute-by-minute tactical control to more predictable and planned strategic traffic management.  Eventually, the majority of communications will be handled by data communications for appropriately equipped users.  It is estimated that with 70 percent of aircraft data-link equipped, exchanging routine controller-pilot messages and clearances via data can enable controllers to safely handle approximately 30 percent more traffic. 

Approximately 70 percent of annual national airspace system delays are attributed to weather.  The NextGen Network Enabled Weather will serve as the backbone of the NextGen weather support services, and provide a common weather picture across NextGen.  The goal of this investment is to cut weather-related delays at least in half by improving the integration and dissemination of aviation weather information.  The benefits will be uniform real-time access to key common weather parameters, common situational awareness, improved utilization of air space across all flight domains, and reduced flight delays.

The NAS Voice Switch will provide the foundation for all air/ground and ground/ground voice communications in the air traffic control environment.  The switches today are static, and our ability to adjust the airspace for contingencies is limited.  Under the current system it is very difficult and time consuming to coordinate and redesign the airspace.  In the future, the impacts of bad weather could be responded to in real-time, thereby minimizing its disruptions to air traffic.  The new voice switch allows us to replace today’s rigid, sector-based airspace design and support a dynamic flow of traffic.  Voice communications capabilities and network flexibility provided by the NAS Voice Switch are essential to the FAA’s ability to implement new NextGen services that are necessary to increase efficiency and improve performance.

At this early stage of NextGen, it is critical to better define operational concepts and the technologies that will support them.  For the first time, FAA is requesting funding for these defining activities in the FY08 budget.  This funding will support two demonstrations and a series of infrastructure development activities.  The primary purposes of these demonstrations are to refine aspects of the trajectory-based operations concept, while lowering risk by phasing in new technologies.  One demonstration will test trajectory-based concepts in the oceanic environment.  The ultimate goal is to increase predictability on long-duration international flights and improve fuel efficiency.  The other demonstration will accelerate the first integrated test of super density operations.  Procedures for increasing capacity at busy airports will be explored.  The demonstration should achieve near-term benefits at the test airport, and give us the tools to implement the same procedures at other locations.

It is important to understand that NextGen is a portfolio program.  The technologies described above, and those that will be defined over the next several years, are interdependent, creating a series of transformations that will truly modernize today’s system.  Let me provide a few examples of this.

In the future, trajectory-based operations will enable many pilots and dispatchers to select their own flight paths, rather than follow the existing system of flight paths, that are like a grid of interstate highways in the sky.  In the high performance airspace of the future, each airplane will transmit and receive precise information about the time at which it and others will cross key points along their paths.  Pilots and air traffic managers on the ground will have the same precise information, transmitted via data communications.  Investments in ADS-B, SWIM and Data Communications are critical to trajectory-based operations.

The NextGen system will enable collaborative air traffic management.  The increased scope, volume, and widespread distribution of information that SWIM provides will improve the quality of the decisions by air traffic managers and flight operators to address major demand and capacity imbalances.  SWIM and NAS Voice Switch are instrumental in achieving this collaborative air traffic management.

With NextGen the impact of weather is reduced through the use of improved information sharing, new technology to sense and mitigate the impacts of weather, improved weather forecasts, and the integration of weather into automation to improve decision-making.  New capabilities in the aircraft and on the ground, coupled with better forecasts and new automation, will minimize airspace limitations and traffic restrictions.  Network Enabled Weather and SWIM are vital investments for these improvements.

We recognize that there are many challenges in converting the JPDO’s vision of the NextGen system into reality.  Because the JPDO is not an implementing or executing agency, the FAA and the other JPDO partner agencies must work closely with the JPDO to develop an implementation schedule for the operational changes required as new technologies are deployed to realize the NextGen vision.  The FAA is using the Operational Evolution Partnership, the new OEP, to guide their transformation to NextGen.  In the past the Operational Evolution Plan successfully provided a mid-term strategic roadmap for the FAA that extended ten years into the future.  The new OEP will include strategic milestones through 2025.  JPDO representatives will participate along with the FAA in OEP development and execution.

FAA will use the OEP to plan, execute and implement NextGen in partnership with private industry.  Required operational implementation schedules will be tracked, as well as dates by which initiatives must be funded in order to meet those schedules.

OEP will provide a single entry point for new NextGen initiatives, jointly developed by the JPDO and the FAA, to enter the FAA capital budget portfolio.  It ties these initiatives directly to the FAA budget process.  Beginning in fiscal year 2008 and continuing in 2009, the FAA worked closely with the JPDO in budget formulation utilizing JPDO budget guidance.  For the fiscal year 2009 budget formulation, the FAA is using a Review Board under the auspices of the OEP Associates Group, which includes the Director of JPDO, to review and prioritize NextGen initiatives based on the JPDO Concept of Operations, JPDO roadmaps, and the NAS Enterprise Architecture.

The NAS and NextGen Enterprise Architectures will provide the backbone of this new OEP by specifying roadmaps for system and certification requirements, operational procedures, program phasing, and prototype demonstrations.  This Operational Evolution Partnership will be the mechanism by which we hold ourselves accountable to our owners, customers, and the aviation community for the FAA’s progress towards the JPDO vision, while assuring that the JPDO and the FAA are jointly on-track to deliver the NextGen system.

Cost will be a vital factor:  we cannot create a NextGen system that is not affordable.  Requirements for the first ten years range from $8 billion to $10 billion.  Preliminary estimates by FAA, JPDO and the Research, Engineering, and Development Advisory Committee (REDAC) suggest that the investments necessary to achieve the end state NextGen system range from $15 billion to $22 billion in FAA funding.  We are working with our users to continuously refine these estimates.

MITRE, working with FAA, has developed a preliminary estimate of the NextGen avionics costs.  It concludes that a wide range of costs are possible, depending on the bundling of avionics and the alignment of equipage schedules.  MITRE concluded that the most probable range of total avionics costs to system users is $14 billion to $20 billion.  This range reflects uncertainty about equipage costs for individual aircraft, the number of very light jets that will operate in high-performance airspace, and the amount of time out of service required for equipage installation.

The importance of developing this system of the future is also quite clear to policymakers in Europe, where a comparable effort known as Single European Sky Air Traffic Management Research (SESAR) is well underway.  This presents both a challenge and an opportunity to the United States.  Creating a modernized, global system that provides interoperability could serve as a tremendous boost to the aerospace industry, fueling new efficiencies while creating jobs and delivering substantial consumer benefits.  Alternatively, we could also see a patchwork of duplicative systems and technologies develop, which would place additional cost burdens on an industry already struggling to make ends meet. 

Last year, Administrator Blakey signed a Memorandum of Understanding with her European counterpart that formalizes cooperation between the NextGen initiative and the SESAR program.  The FAA and the EC are identifying opportunities and establishing timelines to implement, where appropriate, common, interoperable, performance-based air traffic management systems and technologies.  This coordination will address policy issues and facilitate global agreement within international standards organizations such as ICAO, RTCA and Eurocontrol, and contribute greatly to the success of this critical initiative. 

Our European counterparts have released a preliminary cost estimate for SESAR.  SESAR is conceived as a system that, while smaller in scope and size, has similar air traffic management goals as NextGen.  They consider different system scenarios and a range of total costs of $25 billion to $37 billion in US dollars through the year 2020.  SESAR, like NextGen, has a lot of work remaining to refine assumptions and better define the system.  However, there is an important difference in scope between SESAR and NextGen.  While SESAR focuses almost exclusively on air traffic management, NextGen takes what’s called a “curb-to-curb” approach, and includes not only air traffic control, but also airports, airport operations, security and passenger management, and DoD and DHS NAS requirements.

One of the major products for the JPDO, and indeed, one of the critical elements in defining the NextGen initiative itself, is the development of the Concept of Operations, the Enterprise Architecture, and the Integrated Work Plan.  These documents define each NextGen transformed state and how to evolve to it.  They are absolutely essential to the future development of the NextGen system.

The Concept of Operations is a text description of the transformed state of NextGen.  This kind of explanation, offered in one document, is critical to developing the specific requirements and capabilities that will be necessary for our national air transportation system in 2025.  In a sense, the Concept of Operations is like an architect’s blueprints. 

However, to adequately lay the groundwork and basic plans for the NextGen system requires another step in the process, developed concurrently with the Concept of Operations, and that’s the Enterprise Architecture.  The Enterprise Architecture provides the technical details of the transformed NextGen system, much like a builder’s plumbing and wiring diagrams, specifying how the house will get its power, water, sewage, cable and internet connections to the rest of the community.  The Integrated Work Plan is the equivalent of the general contractor’s work plan.  It specifies the timing and interdependencies of multi-agency activities required to achieve the NexGen system vision.

These documents, the Concept of Operations, the Enterprise Architecture, and the Integrated Work Plan are essential to defining the NextGen system and will guide the future investment and capabilities, both in terms of research and systems development.  The JPDO released the NextGen Concept of Operations for public comment on February 28^th.  It is now available on the JPDO website for review and comment by our stakeholders, and we are anxious to receive their feedback.  The NextGen Enterprise Architecture and the Integrated Work Plan should be released within the next few months. 

Our overarching goal in the NextGen initiative is to develop a more automated system that will be flexible enough to accommodate a wide range of users -- very light jets and large commercial aircraft, manned and unmanned aircraft, small airports and large, business and vacation travelers alike, while handling a significantly increased number of operations with a commensurate improvement in safety, security and efficiency.

Mr. Chairman, this concludes our testimony.  We would be happy to answer any questions the Committee may have.