DOT official wants greater worldwide air liberalization

DOT official wants greater worldwide air liberalization The United States and China need to extend further the liberalization of their aviation agreement, Jeffrey N. Shane, U.S. Department of Transportation’s undersecretary for policy said.
   Addressing the Airports Council International at a seminar in Washington last Thursday, Shane said he was disappointed there still exists the need for regulatory process for governments to allocate commercial services.
   “It still requires that we go through a tedious, anachronistic carrier selection process that I had hoped we would have dispensed with by now, and so it still leaves a lot to be desired. We need a more thoroughgoing liberalization of the U.S.-China aviation relationship — one more in keeping with the maturity of the larger economic and trade relationship between our two countries — and I hope that China will soon find its own reasons to embrace that aspiration,” Shane said.
   Shane outlined the expected benefits of the aviation agreement between the United States and China. “The agreement will phase in an additional 200 flights each week between the U.S. and China through 2010 … the agreement will allow 84 new passenger flights, 111 new all-cargo flights, and the entry of five more airlines for each side over the next six years,” Shane said.
   As well as with China, the United States is pursuing more liberalized air services agreements with India, Canada, Hong Kong, Mexico and the European Union, he said.
   Shane told the seminar the DOT plans for a tripling of system capacity over the next two decades and has established the new Joint Planning and Development Office (JPDO) within the Federal Aviation Administration to meet the challenge. The JPDO is being guided by a senior policy committee chaired by U.S. Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta, and includes staff from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Commerce.
   “The JPDO is well on its way to developing the first edition of a national plan that will lay out the long term plan for ensuring that our air transportation system will be able to accommodate whatever increases in demand our growing and robust economy places on it,” Shane said. He added the national plan will be delivered to Congress later this month.