New airport projects might be pushed back

The crowds at LAX this summer may be giving a false sense of the health of air travel in this part of the world. It’s expected that after the summer rush is over that trouble is ahead for the nation’s airports, airlines, and passengers.

Thanks in large part to soaring fuel prices, airfares are on the rise, carriers are grounding flights and cutting capacity. Old planes that are less fuel-efficient are being taken out of service and new fees are driving up what passengers are forced to pay almost every week. Planned airport improvements, with price tags of hundreds of millions of dollars, are in jeopardy.

New projects that have been planned are typically financed by fees airlines pay for using the airport. Industry officials are warning, however, that service cuts are expected to continue and that airport operators will need to consider the impact of a prolonged economic slowdown on the way and they need to consider the effects of a prolonged economic downturn on air travel, before moving forward with expensive capital improvements.

“Our message to the world at large — the federal government, the states and airports — is that the industry is in a severe economic crisis. We need to urge them to take that into account when making decisions,” said John M. Meenan, the Air Transport Association’s executive vice president.

LAX officials have cited robust international travel as the reason for staying the course with the multibillion-dollar plan to upgrade the Tom Bradley International Terminal. Included in the plan are new gates that will be able to accommodate larger aircraft, such as the Airbus A380.

The director of Los Angeles World Airports, Gina Marie Lindsey, voiced caution: “if airline growth continues to moderate, we might have to push back some of our long-term projects.”

Thank you to www.latimes.com for the quotes above, for more information please visit their website.

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