4 ms·

Yes — because such behaviour results in losses for the company and, if sufficiently extreme (i.e., pushing them to bankruptcy) is self-correcting (they leave th

by qubex 7y ago

Yes — because such behaviour results in losses for the company and, if sufficiently extreme (i.e., pushing them to bankruptcy) is self-correcting (they leave the market and vacate the slots).

chrisseaton 7y ago
Why not create a competitive market for slots, rather than incentivising people to literally burn fuel?
- qubex 7y ago
  Because (as is argued elsewhere in this thread), large airlines could buy up all slots and then not operate flights on them, starving their would-be competitors of opportunity to create a basis for themselves.
  - oerpli 7y ago
    But they could just do the same with the current ruling - the only difference would be whether they spend their money on more expensive slots or on wasting fuel.
    - tialaramex 7y ago
      No. There are multiple levels of regulation. Internationally the rule is that you can have "slots" if your airport is busy enough. IATA classifies airports into three levels with only the busiest class 3 "Co-ordinated" airports having slots. A relatively small number of generally very globally important airports qualify, very few of them in the US - but of course these seem notable because you've heard of them. My local airport (which is a ghost town because the airline that ran most flights from there recently collapsed) does not have slots. If you had told them last year you wanted to take off and land six planes a day there they'd just say that sounds great, let us know when to expect them and where to send the bills. London Heathrow on the other hand obviously doesn't have capacity to just have you show up with six extra planes and not cause chaos. But, the international rule doesn't say how you get slots. IATA organises conferences to discuss strategy, but it's completely legal for, say, Russia to decide that all slots in its major airports are for Russian companies. The EU has its own regulations which say if you're a EU member state with an airport that gets slots, you must meet certain EU criteria that aim to create a competitive marketplace, keep unsafe carriers out of European airspace and make everything efficient. The UK implements those regulations through a private company because of course it does the Tories (party presently in government) love private companies, and that's what Airport Coordination Limited is for. Anyway, the EU level regulation means you can't "just" buy more slots, you need to qualify to even be allowed them. If Big Airline A buys Small Airline B, it would not be unusual for the rules to say that too bad, the resulting company still named Big Airline A doesn't get all the resulting slots, some of them must be auctioned off to competitors.
- gpvos 7y ago
  There is such a market. It's just that in some cases, it can be economical for an airline to hang on to an unused slot at cost in the short term if it expects the slot to be profitable in the longer term.
cmcaine 7y ago
You can just fine the companies rather than incentivising them to run empty planes. Better yet, institute a proper carbon tax and either a carefully thought-out market for slots and/or fines.
- m000 7y ago
  Fines are not a solution. When you hear about fines, it is typically some government trying to save face on the media: - The collected fine will not be used to undo the damage to the market/competitors. - The fine won't ever exceed the profits gained by the company because of the infringement. Or else the company will contest it as unfair. That's why you read "EU fines Google with 5 billion" and Google doesn't really care. They will go through the moves of pretending they care, maybe try to shave off part of the fine, but at the end of the day, it's business as usual.
  - yellowapple 7y ago
    Sounds like the solution then is to just make the fines more severe. 5 billion might be an acceptable loss for Google. 50 billion might not be.
- ascar 7y ago
  The whole point of the rule is that it's more expensive to not run the flights than to run them with few passengers. So the fine would need to be higher than the cost of operating the flight resulting in the exact same outcome.

by qubex 7y ago

Yes — because such behaviour results in losses for the company and, if sufficiently extreme (i.e., pushing them to bankruptcy) is self-correcting (they leave the market and vacate the slots).

chrisseaton 7y ago

Why not create a competitive market for slots, rather than incentivising people to literally burn fuel?

qubex 7y ago
Because (as is argued elsewhere in this thread), large airlines could buy up all slots and then not operate flights on them, starving their would-be competitors of opportunity to create a basis for themselves.
- oerpli 7y ago
  But they could just do the same with the current ruling - the only difference would be whether they spend their money on more expensive slots or on wasting fuel.
  - tialaramex 7y ago
    No. There are multiple levels of regulation. Internationally the rule is that you can have "slots" if your airport is busy enough. IATA classifies airports into three levels with only the busiest class 3 "Co-ordinated" airports having slots. A relatively small number of generally very globally important airports qualify, very few of them in the US - but of course these seem notable because you've heard of them. My local airport (which is a ghost town because the airline that ran most flights from there recently collapsed) does not have slots. If you had told them last year you wanted to take off and land six planes a day there they'd just say that sounds great, let us know when to expect them and where to send the bills. London Heathrow on the other hand obviously doesn't have capacity to just have you show up with six extra planes and not cause chaos. But, the international rule doesn't say how you get slots. IATA organises conferences to discuss strategy, but it's completely legal for, say, Russia to decide that all slots in its major airports are for Russian companies. The EU has its own regulations which say if you're a EU member state with an airport that gets slots, you must meet certain EU criteria that aim to create a competitive marketplace, keep unsafe carriers out of European airspace and make everything efficient. The UK implements those regulations through a private company because of course it does the Tories (party presently in government) love private companies, and that's what Airport Coordination Limited is for. Anyway, the EU level regulation means you can't "just" buy more slots, you need to qualify to even be allowed them. If Big Airline A buys Small Airline B, it would not be unusual for the rules to say that too bad, the resulting company still named Big Airline A doesn't get all the resulting slots, some of them must be auctioned off to competitors.
gpvos 7y ago
There is such a market. It's just that in some cases, it can be economical for an airline to hang on to an unused slot at cost in the short term if it expects the slot to be profitable in the longer term.

cmcaine 7y ago

You can just fine the companies rather than incentivising them to run empty planes. Better yet, institute a proper carbon tax and either a carefully thought-out market for slots and/or fines.

m000 7y ago
Fines are not a solution. When you hear about fines, it is typically some government trying to save face on the media: - The collected fine will not be used to undo the damage to the market/competitors. - The fine won't ever exceed the profits gained by the company because of the infringement. Or else the company will contest it as unfair. That's why you read "EU fines Google with 5 billion" and Google doesn't really care. They will go through the moves of pretending they care, maybe try to shave off part of the fine, but at the end of the day, it's business as usual.
- yellowapple 7y ago
  Sounds like the solution then is to just make the fines more severe. 5 billion might be an acceptable loss for Google. 50 billion might not be.
ascar 7y ago
The whole point of the rule is that it's more expensive to not run the flights than to run them with few passengers. So the fine would need to be higher than the cost of operating the flight resulting in the exact same outcome.