Redraw airspace map or prepare for SES3

Europe’s most senior transport official has hinted that the functional airspace blocks – the structural basis on which future air traffic services will be optimised in a Single European Sky framework  – could be controversially redrawn.

Speaking at a public hearing held in Brussels to discuss the new legislative bid that will kickstart Europe’s ATM modernisation programme, the European Union Transport Commissioner Siim Kallas said the FABS were still not genuinely driving much needed performance improvements.

“There is no point in having ‘empty’ FABs on paper. They must deliver added value, improve performance and promote optimum use of airspace. The European Commission is now pursuing this strongly with infringement procedures. But we all need now to take a serious look at how FABs should be built so as to make them efficient and flexible tools to drive performance,” said Kallas.

The idea of possibly redrawing of airspace boundaries that would straddle sovereign airspace of nations within the European Union comes as the Commission drafts its new legislative initiative to accelerate Single European Sky implementation.

Expected by early summer, Single European Sky II+ or simply ‘SES2+’ is expected to address issues such as bringing down operating costs, cleaning up and modernising existing regulation, and designing both performance and institutional matters as triggers for the much needed economic growth in the European aviation sector.

Kallas also spoke about the need to prepare the European Union’s regulatory and oversight apparatus for the future, particularly with regard to economic and performance regulation.

“After eight years, the National Supervisory Authorities are still struggling. EASA’s initial audits reveal understaffing, underfunding and lack of independent expertise – not to mention often unhealthily close relations with those being overseen. EASA itself needs to have the means and clear legal basis to provide high quality rules and oversight to span all technical aviation needs,” said Kallas.

Commenting on the future of the Network Manager that was created in 2009, Kallas said further development of its role and responsibilities would be needed: “We knew it would only be a ‘warm-up round’. It needs to be able to perform a number of new centralised services arising from the SESAR plans [the technological framework on which Europe’s ATM modernisation effort depends]. It needs to be efficient, driven with industry expertise and focused on a set of services that are most efficiently performed at network level.”

“Today, we are a long way from creating a single European airspace,” the transport chief told the hearing. “The Single Sky is still not delivering. But we do have the tools to make it a success. We are still hampered by a high level of delays.

“As yet, there is no crisis. Air traffic in Europe is stable, even stagnating. But this business is very much a cyclical one. It has its ups and downs. So if we are not ready to cope with the likely rise in traffic in the years ahead, then the future effect of a demand crisis is multiplied. And it would put a strain on the aviation sector that might be unbearable.

“If we do not get on with preparing SES2+ in the short time left to this Commission, then the next Commission may – or very likely, will – find itself working on a ‘SES3’ package. If we do not pave the way now and prepare for the pick-up in demand, we will find ourselves in a crisis situation that we could – and should – have avoided.”

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