City Hall's New Airport Scam
Guess to whom City Hall plans to give your money next? Airlines! Why? To fly where no one wants to go, to fly to the middle of nowhere, to fly to . . . Palmdale.
Uh, did I mention, "Why?" To reduce traffic at LAX -- even though traffic at LAX is already down, lower this year than last!
And the L.A. Times, having just gotten an A+ for an editorial, is getting an F on this story. Why? Because its reporter slumped into "press release journalism," by stating there has been no regular commercial air flights there for nine years. Which is true, except for the nine years part -- it was nine MONTHS ago, which is when the last subsidized Palmdale flights fizzled.
Read all about it at MooreIsBetter.com, if you're not worried about ruining your weekend.
Posted by Walter Moore @ 2/02/2007 04:25:00 PM
11 Comments:
This won't overload air traffic control, and any burden it imposes will be short-lived, because no one wants to fly to Palmdale. The traffic -- empty planes flying on fuel paid for by us, the taxpayers -- will end the minute the City Hall subsidy ends.
More pointless expenditures the sole purpose of which is to demonstrate "leadership" and "vision". . . .
It would help your credibility, Uncle Walty, if you had a clue. LA World Airports doesn't get direct city taxpayer money, it only has the money it makes from its operations, from joint-financing deals with the airlines or from the occasional federal grant.
So if you want to complain that your precious federal tax or airfare dollars are being used to subsidize the Palmdale service, go ahead, but don't try to sell us this assinine notion that City Hall is paying for it. There's not one thin dime of City Hall bucks in the Palmdale deal. Gotcha!
Beyond that, learn a little bit about what's really going on with commercial aviation in Southern California before you jibber-jabber about "leadership" and "vision." There's a point past which LAX can't absorb an endless amount of air traffic, either on the ground or in the air, and it's gonna have to go somewhere else. Better to plan ahead, pump-prime the market and be ready for that eventuality than wake up some future morning with LAX completely overloaded with no backup in sight.
But planning ahead's pretty difficult when your head's filled with meaningless rhetoric and your eyes are glazed over, eh?
Reality is that no airline can make it out there commerically at the present time. Once the subsidy money dries up, they go away. The last airline to make the effort was case in point.
Now that's not to say that some day in the distant future (30 years?) they'll be hailing as visionaries the folks who wisely set this land aside for the future Palmdale airport, but the problem is that in the name of regionalism we have present day politicians doing ribbon cuttings and proclaiming it a great day because they pay some airline to run a few flights out of Palmdale when it really jsut diverts attention from the real truth that Ontario, not Palmdale is the only viable alternative to LAX between now and 2040.
C'mon guys focus your efforts on Ontario and forget the BS at Palmdale for now. It's a waste of time and money.
8:56 --
Actually, I think we ALL know that LAWA gets its money from its operations, as opposed to getting it from property taxes, etc.
What YOU apparently don't understand is that when a city-owned monopoly charges more than it costs to provide the services it is supposed to provide, its "profit" is effectively a tax. Indeed, look at your ticket the next time you fly, and you will see airport taxes. Those taxes, plus above-cost rents charged to airlines, vendors, etc. are paid by us, the people.
Here's another news bulletin for you: we, the people, also pay federal taxes. And, as for your assertion that only federal money will be used for this subsidy, please prove it. The article and press release I read indicate the Mayor's office and LAWA are patting themselves on the back for using LAWA funds for this.
Planning ahead is fine. It should, however, be based on reality. The reality is, JUST NINE MONTHS AGO, the one airline operating at Palmdale closed down due to lack of interest. The reality is, no one wants to fly to Palmdale. The reality is, the number of passengers at LAX is DOWN not UP. The reality is, if and when demand ever rises to the point where people want to fly from Palmdale, the private sector will start flying there.
But by all means, don't let reality and practicality interfere with "bold vision." After all, no one's really paying for it, right? It's only "LAWA money."
(Where do they hire these staffers?! The Home Depot parking lot?)
P.S. There is an easy way to effectlvely increase capacity at LAX without spending a dime, which was part of my mayoral platform. All we have to do is require the pure cargo / no passenger flights to use Palmdale. That would increase the capacity for passenger flights by about 30%; would not interfere with passenger flights, as they would all continue to use LAX as a hub; and would not interfere terribly with cargo flights, as they would all use Palmdale as a hub.
But I guess that's just "jibber jabber" to people of vision who think it makes sense for passengers to have to make connecting flights in two different airports.
"It should, however, be based on reality. The reality is, JUST NINE MONTHS AGO, the one airline operating at Palmdale closed down due to lack of interest."
So let's talk about "reality". Where did that airline fly? North Las Vegas, that's where. To an airport that's about as inconvenient as you can possibly imagine if you want to go to Vegas. Do you think anyone would be stupid enough to fly to that airport from anywhere? And the price? Only a little over 3 times the price you would pay to fly from Ontario.
There are tons of people who would gladly use Palmdale if a few changes were made to make it more accessible. You're totally & utterly wrong (big shock) when you suggest no one wants to fly to Palmdale. The simple fact is that more & more people have moved north and northeast of LA due to exhorbitant housing costs (yes, I know, Walter, you don't believe THAT'S true either). I work in Century City and have 7 co-workers in my small firm that live in Palmdale or Lancaster. That's almost 10% of our employees. Multiple airlines have been inquiring for more than a decade about Palmdale; if the infrastructure in & around were improved there would be no problem getting major carriers to add Palmdale to their routes. Look how many people drive 30 miles to fly out of Burbank or Long Beach just to avoid the nightmare of LAX traffic, plus the security lines. This is just another example of Walter Moore opening his trap about something he hasn't researched & knows nothing about. It's incredibly easy to just scream TAX WASTE whenever a city/county/state entity proposes an idea. But idiot-Moore refuses to accept something actually needs to be done in all areas of transportation Southern California. He still thinks that if we don't improve anything, poor people will just get up & move away leaving plenty of room for his kind. I have news for you Walter, the high cost of housing & the extreme traffic are sending a lot of intelligent, well-educated workers out of state in record numbers. Guess who's replacing them? Illegal Mexicans who don't mind living 30 to a house & cramming 15 guys into a van and driving 60 miles to a job because it's so much better than what they had in Mexico. People who can afford to get up & leave here WILL. And ARE.
8:25
You say that intelligent people are leaving in droves....are you naiive enough to think that airline service out of PALMDALE will keep them from LEAVING?????
You have employees who drive from Palmdale to Century City? Welcome to the real world!!!!
Here's a NEWS FLASH for you!!! People are leaving BECAUSE the illegals are RUINING this city! Gangs are taking over and the place is turning into Tijuana North.
People are DISGUSTED with the Mexican mayor and the Mexican City Council. People are disgusted with the phony taxes imposed on them.
People are disgusted with paying tqaxes to support the illegals!!!!
The AIRPORT has NOTHING to do with the price of beans! It's just another reason to get the hell out of Dodge!
LA IS A FAILED STATE! PERIOD!!! END OF DISCUSSION!!!!
Walter, get yourself elected to the "City Clowncil" where you belong, so you can learn not only how the City works but also a few things about politics.
Nobody said that only federal money would be used for the subsidy. That's why the poster even talked about LAWA money. But if you don't want federal tax dollars used, don't blame the Mayor. Call the president (who you probably helped elect in 2000 and 2004 back when you were honest and admitted that you were a Republican) or your congressman. The feds offered the grant, LA and Palmdale jumped on it. It was a grant to promote service to small airports. If LAWA didn't get it, someone else would have. Get real.
(Oh, sorry - getting real would undermine your whole premise for blogging.)
As for who might go to Palmdale Airport, maybe not someone from Century City, but just about anybody in the Valley would find Palmdale easily as close (time-wise) as LAX at many times of the day. Maybe not evening rush hour, but that's about the only time. Freeway distance in L.A. is measured as much by time as by miles, and you can haul-ass out to Palmdale from Van Nuys in about the same time you could get to LAX, and with a lot less aggravation.
But then you wouldn't know much about that, right Walter? You only visit the Valley in cyberspace...
What's the big deal about subsidizing air service? Didn't the feds already do that in spades after 9-11? At least here the public might get something for it.
It's hard to have much sympathy for the poor old airlines, most of which are in the red or bankruptcy. They don't charge what their service is worth and no wonder they take a bath every year.
It's getting to be like the railroads and buses - they don't charge what they're worth either and need subsidies to survive. Are you ready for government-subsidized airlines on a regular basis, or worse yet, government-RUN airlines? When the private sector airlines keep consolidating or collapsing, it's either that or forget about flying. If airlines always charged what their tickets are really worth, only rich folks or business travelers could afford it.
Imagine Walter Moore stuck in Los Angeles all the time because he couldn't afford to travel. Live in fear!
Walter:
I usually agree with you, but I'm not with you on this one.
We need both Palmdale and Ontario to become busy regional airports, in order to cut down on air traffic elsewhere.
Traffic is down right now at LAX because the airlines, especially those going cross-country or overseas, still haven't fully recovered ridership from pre-9/11 levels. This is especially true when passengers think about the security screening hassles they get at LAX.
If real effort was put into marketing Palmdale, it could get passengers from the Antelope Valley, Santa Clarita, the north Valley, and any other new development up there (Tejon Pass, etc).
You could bring passengers to Palmdale by Park & Ride (like they do from VN to LAX), by regular transit agencies, or even by a short rail line (Metrolink).
LAX can't expand any more. The residents won't allow it, the 405 can't handle it, and there's no room left. In the next few years, more and more people from abroad are going to use LAX to come into SoCal.
Think of the other existing regional airports:
--Long Beach: small, adding flights (JetBlue) but hemmed in by development and activist residents
--John Wayne/OC: it took a decade of litigation to expand their terminal, but their capacity now is as high at it will ever get
--Burbank: recent expansion and security upgrades help, but it's also hemmed in by suburbia. Part of the main runway is in LA City, which has sued to limit flights to protect residents of Sun Valley and other nearby communities from noise.
--Van Nuys: used only for private jets, but trying to set flight schedules that don't bother residents of Encino and Sherman Oaks. This was an issue in the Valley cityhood election.
Since El Toro won't become an airport, and the two former USAF bases in San Bernardino county are spoken for, this leaves Ontario and Palmdale as our best options.
More people will visit here, and more people will live here. We need more airport capacity around the region. Since we will never get a decent replacement for Amtrak (see the book "Derailed"), this is the only option we have.
Walter, as a taxpayer I appreciate you looking out for how our money is spent. But compared to the larger and more useless expenditures the clowncil makes, this one isn't so bad. It actually does have a good purpose.
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