DOT to Create Panel to Address Airline Industry Woes

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood plans to form a special panel that will put together a plan to fix the airline industry. The secretary says the panel, the Federal Advisory Committee on the Future of Aviation, should produce a roadmap for the aviation industry’s future within a year.

LaHood revealed his plans to form the panel last week, after a daylong, closed-door forum on the state of the industry attended by a cross section of industry representatives. Aviation union groups had requested the meeting.

The nation’s airlines showed a cumulative loss of about $60 billion between 2000 and the first half of this year, according to financial data filed with the DOT.

In a letter sent to LaHood a day before the forum, US Airways CEO Doug Parker, said, “Our request of the administration… is do no harm. Please do not impose any additional taxes, fees or unfunded mandates on this already over-taxed industry.”

Parker also wrote, “Please allow us the ability to fix our industry through rational business decisions and actions and self-help mechanisms.” The overarching problem, the groups said, is the U.S. has never had a coherent national air transportation policy that has been updated over time.