@jdeas. Yes, not only “public” ramp areas at each public airport, but also “public” runways and taxiways that are not allowed to charge fees/taxes. The FAA has the authority to do this, they just need the incentive. If a private enterprise such as an FBO wants to “claim” rights to the ramp area in front of their operation, and charge fees, then OK if the city/municipality gives them approval, by vote of elected representatives. But leave the “publically designated areas” such as runways, taxiways, and specific ramp areas, out of the fee/tax money grubbing scheme.
 
roadrunner20 said:
Can the landing fee be enforced vs a citation issued on a red light violation?
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Excellent question. Consider a case of landing, taxi back, depart, no parking ramp or FBO use. When a landing fee bill arrives in the mail, why not just toss it in the trash? What enforcement options are available to the billing agency?

FWIW, I see nothing related to landing fees in FAA Order 2150.3C (Compliance and Enforcement Program). I could be wrong, but I find it hard to imagine an FAA interest in chasing $3 landing fees.

BTW, Vector isn't the only player pushing fee collection services: https://www.altaport.com/blog/altap...nd-transient-management-solution-for-airports
 
wsquare said:
@jdeas. Yes, not only “public” ramp areas at each public airport, but also “public” runways and taxiways that are not allowed to charge fees/taxes. The FAA has the authority to do this, they just need the incentive. If a private enterprise such as an FBO wants to “claim” rights to the ramp area in front of their operation, and charge fees, then OK if the city/municipality gives them approval, by vote of elected representatives. But leave the “publically designated areas” such as runways, taxiways, and specific ramp areas, out of the fee/tax money grubbing scheme.
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These are also city/county run airports that don’t have a FBO that are also charging. Like in this article.
 
DanH said:
Excellent question. Consider a case of landing, taxi back, depart, no parking ramp or FBO use. When a landing fee bill arrives in the mail, why not just toss it in the trash? What enforcement options are available to the billing agency?

FWIW, I see nothing related to landing fees in FAA Order 2150.3C (Compliance and Enforcement Program). I could be wrong, but I find it hard to imagine an FAA interest in chasing $3 landing fees.

BTW, Vector isn't the only player pushing fee collection services: https://www.altaport.com/blog/altap...nd-transient-management-solution-for-airports
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They don’t care if you don’t use ramp facilities they get you on every landing. Go arounds are no longer free if this gets implemented.

They will send you a bill at the end of the month for every time you did a touch and go that day too.

They also have a call center for billing and collections. (I’m being slightly sarcastic here but I’m sure they will try to send you to collections).
 
DanH said:
That's the question. How do they enforce collection?
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No idea but there are collections agencies that then put it on your credit report if it never gets paid. I’m sure there is more to this but probably close to the way they will try.

Or filing an aircraft lien with the FAA? Just ideas.
 
Illegitimate charges are sent to collections every day and can be contested with the credit reporting agencies.

Edit: this will go back to the “legitimacy” of the right to charge a fee. Ultimately if you don’t care about your credit rating, then nothing will happen. That is until enough fees are piled up that the agency sues you for a judgement.
 
roadrunner20 said:
What happens when the registered owner receives a bill in the mail, but he/she wasn't the pilot?
Same thing happened with red light cameras when the owner wasn't the driver? This is how Florida got in trouble years ago.
Can the landing fee be enforced vs a citation issued on a red light violation?
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Depends on how the law authorizing it is written. In the case of traffic laws, many were written stating that tickets in that state had to be given by law enforcement officers. However the camera violations were being processed by employees not law enforcement who owuld sent out the tickets, so that killed many programs when they were taken to court.
 
Possibly late to this discussion but apparently Deland city council meeting on this topic went poorly when all of the opposition showed up. The landing fee resolution did not pass. It’ll take the same turnout from concerned citizens at other airports to stop these efforts. The bummer here is that AOPA only published the article about these fees within a day of the meeting. There needs to be a better effort to get the word out to the folks that can affect the outcomes of these votes.
 
tnelson said:
Possibly late to this discussion but apparently Deland city council meeting on this topic went poorly when all of the opposition showed up. The landing fee resolution did not pass. It’ll take the same turnout from concerned citizens at other airports to stop these efforts. The bummer here is that AOPA only published the article about these fees within a day of the meeting. There needs to be a better effort to get the word out to the folks that can affect the outcomes of these votes.
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Recording is available online. It's a good example of how to address concerns when speaking to a local council. No one is abusive, no torches, no pitchforks. Just clear statements, some of which were quite pointed...but quite on point. One fellow speaks of the payroll his flight school puts into the local economy, and another informs the Council he will cancel plans to move his investment firm to Deland if the motion passes. There was the senior man at MT Propeller, based on the field, and more.

I got a lot done for my airport by spending a few evenings with the councilmen at the local VFW. They're not bad folks. They just need educated. And a few rounds beats a pitchfork session.

Start around 1:00.

https://delandfl.portal.civicclerk.com/event/388/media
 
I remember the great state (eye-roll) of Florida was doing something like this before -- a couple of "spotters" at Sun-n-fun would take pictures of various airplanes and send use-tax bills to the owners.

...And now I'm wondering out loud...

Much like posting your phone number and substituting Letters/Words/Symbols for digits (e.g. SO3-687-6S4S) to defeat 'bots from scraping/using your phone number, could we perhaps change the programmed N-number to something that was human readable but not machine...A Turing Test for ADS-B of sorts.

Conversion of the N-number to ICAO24 would need to conform to N-# to N-#####, or N-#-$$ to N-####-$. Those with trailing digits of 1, 5, I, S, 4, A, etc. might make use of this.

N20221 would become N2022I (two zero two two 'eye' or 'ell') . Still produces a valid ICAO24 and it's human readable, it's just not your airplane, ergo no bill from the airport. I wonder what would show up on the ARTCC "strips" or scope -- The number that you give on first contact or the ICAO24 decoded to N-number and displayed via FUSION...

...I know, I know...going back into my cave...
 
tnelson said:
Possibly late to this discussion but apparently Deland city council meeting on this topic went poorly when all of the opposition showed up. The landing fee resolution did not pass. It’ll take the same turnout from concerned citizens at other airports to stop these efforts. The bummer here is that AOPA only published the article about these fees within a day of the meeting. There needs to be a better effort to get the word out to the folks that can affect the outcomes of these votes.
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This is great news. I agree AOPA should have posted this on their YouTube channel and given more time before the vote. I’m sure they would have gotten the word out faster using multiple platforms. I only saw this because of our forum. I would have missed it otherwise.
 
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