committee on transportation and infrastructure will come to order and greater appreciation for and admiration of those who slog their way through the icy washington and you a very long opening statement simply say that we heard from the majority members of the commission on the report to the national  commission on the future needs of transportation national policy and revenue study review commission commission was was very blunt in pointing out  clear assessment of the needs an analysis of solutions a range of options recommendations to achieve those investments and policy objectives that were set out in the report that i thought was very very clear very well written and i've read about ninety five percent of it and very clearly framed the choices facing the congress as we develop policy options for the future the traveling public the users of our great interstate and national highway system we're on the threshold of a new transformational era of transportation i call it the fourth transfer transformational in the history of transportation in the last century was very stark in the commission's report was there blunt assessment that there is no free lunch in transportation infrastructure rebuilding the portfolio highway transit bridge needs in this country is expensive but we have a very rich portfolio of surface transportation and it is not an option to ignore it is a requirement for us to invest in maintain it and to expand upon it the department of transportation in two thousand and six report from the bureau of transportation says the passenger vehicle miles traveled over the previous decade grew fifty percent truck traffic grew one hundred percent but our  roadway capacity grew point six five percent i don't think we need necessarily to have  vehicle miles to expand at the same ratio as vehicle miles traveled but we do need to continue the gravy and the pass to the enhancement of at least our existing portfolio and i think that the commission has pointed us in the right direction and i think it is it's two years of hard work very intensive hearings across the country produced one of the finest government reports that i have observed in my years of service in congress secretary peters was a minority view on that report and we look forward to hearing  invited her tenure at the first family to appear separately on the same day but that was not possible and she is here today and we thank you for affording her this separate opportunity to present  her opinion also i highly recommend that you sell your car and that you afford yourself mass transit or move close to the hill and walk like i did this for i ha no problem getting here got rid of the car and i see bill maher up there because i had to give you all the bus and transit routes and i think metro is running on time in spite of the ice and snow this morning and if we could get more over here you know i'm one of the strongest advocates but i think that what we need to do is it's not always how much money you spend it's sometimes how you spend it there's no question we do need more again for the record long term options i think they presented an excellent long term options which i support i think political timing on the political reality we have to deal with the forty cent proposal  commissioner shankey who said let me quote one federal dollar to a transfer if you had one federal dollar to a transportation project that adds a minimum of ten to fourteen years to the project before it actually gets started that cost time money and then as far as cost for a billion dollar project today by the time you finish it under a federal schedule would add three to four billion dollars in cost so we can get more for sometimes the same amount or a little little bit more if we better utilize our funds but the options are presented are great i look forward to hearing the secretary's comments i apologize to  chairman i love the secretary she's very popular very photogenic but i i'm on government reform and roger is feeling the show today and i'm a senior member of that committee so i'll be hopping back and forth so i'm required in both places and i apologize in advance and welcome corinne golden student a leader from my district who shadowing me today thank you so much mr chairman thank you for your opening comments mike greatly appreciate although we must say we would welcome a surface transportation program on steroids  recognize on a day to day basis that our transportation system is in dire need of major investment i mean not only do we have bridges as in your state falling down  you know we have nearly one hundred fifty thousand bridges that are either functionally obsolete or structurally obsolete i think if we posted all those bridges with big signs saying caution you're about to drive over a bridge that structurally deficient it might  given our problems internationally with our huge trade deficit you can't export the jobs in the economic activity that comes from transportation investment makes us more competitive internationally and certainly we need jobs at this point in time so for a host of thank you very much mr chairman i just would like briefly to say that our country is in a competitive situation in a rapidly changing world and over the last forty fifty years we have radically reformed major sectors of our economy by deregulating different modes to lower cost doing business in the american economy so that we could maintain our standard of living and have a future for our children if we under invest in our infrastructure we're going to be losing efficiency as a society and becoming less competitive going forward so i frankly been disappointed that the administration has not provided more leadership in this area helping focus attention and gathering the resources necessary not just throwing money at the problem but if we if we continue to society in the efficiency with which we move goods and people it's going to raise costs and over time move the activity to other places in the world and we'll be poor for it so that's kind of the chairman's talk of this being a transformational period i hope it is a period where people use the opportunity it's a crisis slow for not just six months but for a number of years and that infrastructure investment was a logical way of helping to move through this period and i hope we do take that  think about it good advice and then build a program to deal with the economic slowdown short term but do that and help make our country more competitive longer term with adequate infrastructure that the commission recommended major restructuring of the way we do this which i think is wonderful because it will increase public confidence that the money that is chairman for having this hearing and i look forward to hearing thank you thank you very much for thoughtful remarks born of twenty years of serving as the surface transportation subcommitte discussions with many people around the nation about the current and future transportation needs of our nation i believe that this time has been very well spent and i value and appreciate the contributions by all of my fellow commissioners although i do disagree with some of the central elements of the commission report that disagreement in no way detracts from my respect for my colleagues on the commission they are to be commended for their hard work and their dedication last week the administration released your two thousand and nine budget which funds the final limitations in our current policies and it demands a new direction it is short sighted to continue reliance on a fuel tax of the same time we are pushing increased energy efficiency better air quality and a reduction in our dependence on foreign oil given the significance of our transportation challenges and the resultant effect on our economy and quality of life it is imperative that we work together to reach a bipartisan consensus on the nature of these challenges while we may not always be able to reach complete agreement on the appropriate solutions to our service transportation problems we must come together and agree on a common definition of what the problem is and recognize that fundamental change is indeed required i have spent many years working in this field and i have concluded that the central problem in transportation today is not how much we are paying for infrastructure but perhaps how we are paying for infrastructure our current transportation funding and indirect user provides the wrong signals to both users and owners of them resulting in overuse of the system especially during peak periods often compare this to the tragedy of the menswear was overused to a point in the commons of course which was no longer productive in fact i believe that the chronic revenue shortfalls we face are more a symptom of the problem than the cause americans overwhelmingly oppose gas attack and increases because real world experience tells them that they don't provide a benefit to them this is evidenced by a failure in syste performance over the past twenty five years despite substantial increases in federal state and local transportation spending much of it from fuel taxes we have witnessed a rapid growth in highway congestion in the past twenty five years highway funding has e performance of their transportation system but also are unwilling to support transportation related tax increases in the transportation field argue that we have simply failed to communicate the importance of transportation to the average american to me and to other observers this represents a failure in public confidence in traditional approaches and public opinion surveys confirm this view a recently released survey out of washington state found the voters preferred variable tolling to gas tax increases by a margin of seventy seven to seventeen consistent with a number of others conducted across the united states that have found support for gas taxes and growing support for direct charges i agree with those who call for greater federal leadership and the commission report does call for that i do not however the federal leadership simply implies substantially greater federal spending and dramatically higher fuel taxes in fact it is far more critical that the federal government establish their policies provide appropriate incentives and allocate resources more efficiently than it is for substantial increases in federal spending that we on the federal level work together and demonstrate this type of leadership truly believe that there has never been a more exciting time in the history of surface transportation mr chairman i agree that is a transformational era we are at a point where change is not only conceivable but is actually being implemented in various parts of the united states we have before us a tremendous opportunity an opportunity to make significant changes that will reverse a substantial performance decline in the nation's surface transportation infrastructure and this will benefit the american families that depend on our infrastructure every day mr chairman again i thank the committee for allowing me to testify and i look forward to working with you to address these transportation the most impressive infrastructure projects this world has seen to date but today there are problems with the gas tax is ineffective at reducing congestion and that really gets mr chairman to what i was saying it's not how much but how because w travel survey i think underscored some of the issues that were facing time that are using the transportation system most of us tend to think that they are all commuting to work and back to most of your commuting to work and back in fact the truth is only about fifty percent of them are making trips to work and back twenty percent of them are retired which could argue that they have some discretion when and how they use the system through a small change in pricing we can incentivize people advocating for a lot of people who are undecided about this or confused by it would come around to support it when i am traveling in my district when i'm traveling other parts of the country and have a serious discussion about privatization tolling and rationing is the solution to the nation's transportation crisis is a narrow myopic uninspired and fragmentation approach does not rise to the merit of being called  the response was very seriously and had a lot of background and the commission worked very hard to attempt to reach a consensus but ultimately failed the two questions if you could discuss the areas  there is congestion but it's it's i guess our only at certain times and in certain areas that we could probably run the system more efficiently with some kind of congestion pricing or other way of dealing with it could you flesh that out a little bit with the idea if you for example raise the gas tax or some other everyone and then give a discount if they didn't drive better than charging people extra if they did i don't know i'm just curious how much thought is really been given to how that sort of thing would work we are familiar with what's been going on in europe in london and some other areas  but that's cities do have not pricing but they do have rules trucks aren't allowed in during certain hours so they have to do deliveries at night it's been suggested for the alameda corridor as if we'd run trucks back and forth from beach at night they would have had to go through this tremendous expense but that involves changing a lot of systems and there's resistance from people who work and everyone else anyway if you could just address those in the brief time  that there are many recommendations in the commission report that i do support and did agree with as did other members of the minority the camp organs of our transportation system the multimedia nature of that system and how that must continue into the future the opportunity to simplify the federal programs and funding categories was an area of agreement as was the proposals for streamlining the current planning and environmental processes and we also agreed that we needed to make much more efficient investment in transportation in the future had a compelling national interest we were building the interstate and people signed on to doing that and there was a great deal of public support for doing that but today the federal programs are so bifurcated some one hundred of them in our highway and transit programs that there is do by streamlining these programs and more of the authority and responsibility back down to the state and local level i have most of my adult life in this field and if i truly thought the gas tax was the way to go i would be the first to advocate that but i simply do not and it is not an ideological opinion it is a position based on my look at serious look over this time the federal interest in terms of going forward has to be defined very very clearly and we should collect at the federal level are actually two different times that what congestion pricing is it's designed to spread traffic flows more efficiently to reduce the enormous economic cost of congestion and reduce pollution and by incentivizing a price signals just a few people to not use the road at that given period of time i would call your attention what i call the the august in washington phenomena many of who happen to be in town here those who get out of town do but those of us who are in town here in august find that the transportation system works significantly better than it does the tuesday after labor day where it goes in a handcart back then what happens then is probably no more than five percent of people are using the road during that time but it makes an enormous difference in how efficient that road operates gas taxes are used but they simply are too indirect to influence those types of decisions about when and how to use the road more ambitious program as about a tie between the gas tax and congestion pricing that's king county area the urban center the the thing that's referred to in your testimony is a polling was only on the issue of tolling a bridge that has very little controversy over tolling bridge projects and that was the issue the statement here is totally inaccurate that is not a general sentiment shared by the people of washington state particularly outside the urban area about even in the urban area but when you look at one specific project should you apply tolling yes now as to the issue of the you have to told the existing infrastructure in the vicinity to drive people onto our project and support taxpayers have paid for existing state or federal highways that we would told those in order to facilitate some private for profit investment to deal with another problem what i believe we need to do what our responsibility it's federal level is is to protect and ensure that the federal interests are met in telling projects and the way we do that is incorporating standards for connecting operating maintaining the interstate connectivity with other parts the transportation system the mobility of people and products that is conducive to interstate commerce and transparency in the process fair and open opportunity to increase the efficiency of the overall system and i wouldn't rule that out i think state local government ought to have the opportunity to look at it thank you but but again that's that's the problem here people want to make a profit if they're going to invest and to invest they say well you have to tell your existing infrastructure i tell you that would enjoy one percent or zero percent support in my state i imagine arizona wouldn't be too much different if you said gee we're going to make you pay to use the highways you've already paid for i don't think people in arizona are that different than the people up in the northwest so that presents sort of a conundrum if we're going to depend upon private investment when you use the word protects i guess i'm puzzled that the minority report object to the conditions that are suggested by the commission on the p p p now i understand that you can attract a lot more interest from the private sector if you say hey we're going to give you a license to print money you're going to have non compete  agreements we're going to toll the existing surrounding infrastructure you can control all the tolling it no limits or like in indiana will put a floor on your toll increases but the commission said if you want to protect the public interest you need to have conditions why why would the minority report object to modest conditions to protect the public interest even mr deval when he was here year ago or so it made it that non compete and other things were problematic people should be aware of them and in fact he said that you is that the commission report places numerous conditions on public private partnerships beyond what i think protect the federal interest and in fact their judgment for state and local officials who are entering the end of these agreements with the private sector  ignoring some of the concerns raised by the commission let's let's look at the skyway project money was diverted to the general fund of the city for one year consumption in general fund projects from the payments they received for that project you don't believe we should have restrictions on on these projects that the money would have to go back into transportation projects or even more specifically as the commission recommends into the corridor that's relevant to that transportation project if you're going to tolls or congestion prices mr chairman as a transportation professional i would prefer the investment go back into system however in the case of this congress highway that that route was actually my cock in the city of chicago my and the mayor took and monetise enact that that was at the end of the day in the public interest of the people in that region but he did divert the money and you don't agree with diverting the money to non transportation as a policy so i think if we were protecting the federal interest in the public interest we would want to say that it's federal policy where the federal government is a partner or has a significant interest in a p p p or it has a significant effect on the national transportation infrastructure that we would want to see that money used for our widely recognized infrastructure deficit i mean you do agree that there is a current infrastructure deficit and we do need more investment without determining where that money comes from you would agree with that statement i absolutely agree that that's all right so i'm going to keep going it that way will save you time because i mean if i miss the vote to adjourn it's not going to cost me my congressional career i percent at the same time you pointed to the fact that here in d c that when people are on vacation i e they don't have to go to work i don't think they randomly go out and drive around at rush hour that traffic problems pretty much aba when those people don't have to work i mean i think there's almost a contradiction here and and i really would like to see some substantial no there's one consultant out there who's fighting some thing to say that fifty percent of the travel at rush hour is discretionary i would assume what he is talking about is some people are driving their kids to school before they go to work and he'd say that was discretionary some kids are picking up their school their kids and moving them around well you know after work i don't know where you get that but i got to tell you from the seniors aren't rushing at least in my part of the country to get out and drive around rush hour they're just not and so i really would like to see some real substantiation as opposed to one consultants opinion based on one relatively small sample i just really doubt that but beyond that the question becomes and mr mike referred to this unfortunate had to go to more important things like baseball but he talked about mass transit and the and and the fact that you need that option and that works particularly today but the problem is if you raise the prices for congestion pricing and you don't dedicate that money into building the mass transit then the people aren't going to have an option in the future in the present tense many people don't have an option when you impose congestion pricing you have just sent them a message that is sell your house quit your job get another job you know if they don't have a viable comparable alternative and terms of time and cost by mass transit and there's a heck of a lot of people who don't have that today because of our lack of investment so i mean do you recommend imposing congestion pricing when people don't have a viable alternative and they are work commuters i mean isn't there an incredible equity issue here i mean the exact won't care they'll get to work faster and they can pay the ten bucks but the factory line workers can say gosh i can't afford ten bucks to get to work i'm going to have to leave an extra hour early because i can't take that road anymore chairman let me answer the question with that couple of ways first of all increasing gas taxes especially on low income people in our pop very much a bird in fact  well commission staff analysis sorry it's the commission staff which you would disagree with i guess being in the minority on the commission says that the fuel tax the congestion pricing is at least twice as inequitable  a fuel tax by income and i don't think they're talking about rich people and here let me put another example i drive a funky old car i can squeeze out twenty mpg i'm really lucky in my sixty four dart now here we go we don't have tolls but if i had to pay a one dollar toll i live out east of eugene in a smaller town and the the one zero five is getting kind of had to pay a one dollar toll you know it figures out that i would have to drive four hundred miles to break even here so i got a question then you know a lot of lower income people are driving less fuel efficient cars don't mind for sentiment but you know i also don't like making car payments but you know there are real questions here i mean between the gas tax  d i believe the congestion pricing when you apply it in the real world onto what the equivalents would be so you know i think that's something that really needs to be dealt let me let me get to another issue as as i understand the minority position you're proposing basically to phase out federal investment in the system that correct mr chairman i would tend to do that over time but this is an area where i didn't  dollars but here is also what i think we do i talked earlier about the federal role and i refer also to a very good report on this topic as well we don't have a clearly defined federal role today and that is manifested itself as i said earlier in a problems or would you suggest additional investment in construction some transit and other things are necessary because that seems to me the real critical point here i mean for your home state do you  yielding just a couple of quick questions one of the things i heard they're going to do this i heard they're going to do this every twenty minutes they're going to do it every that i think all of us agree that we need we need more net money into the nation's infrastructure that's pretty much agreed upon right secretary there are some figures that are thrown around we did a two hundred eighty four billion dollar bill the american society of civil engineers says we need about one point six for five years investment the question is how we get there and the commission did bring forth forty gas tax i think that it would be interesting for you and i don't know if you've done that elations to come back and see what can be saved by revamping the process revamping some of the federal guidelines i've been through a couple of projects one was an interchange i started in central florida i had dinner the other night i just saw at a restaurant off of it and i showed someone i said we broke ground there but it took fifteen or sixteen years to get the approvals by that time the funding had doubled or tripled just like your fellow commissioner ed cited so what can we say calculate what we could save revamping  the process and then there isn't we lack a federal policy public private partnership some people are slamming them and maybe some of them are appropriate the chairman  deal where they were born as foreign investment money and there's lots of foreign aid that's money that could buy up our infrastructure but there are policy questions that remain unanswered rendall came before us and first was go on the open block and then he got burned and now they're selling it to the pennsylvania turnpike authority raising the revenue and i've got english and all the guys in upstate pennsylvania yellin our own candidates slams earmarks but you took eight hundred fifty three million when we failed to earmark what well we did earmark one thousand one hundred fifty five projects and into five i don't remember having a public hearing on those five i don't remember i never met with the bureaucrats who made the decision i don't use the bureaucrat i've met with you but those that made that intimate decision of how to dispose of of eight hundred  leadership of the committee are to sit down and decide what public policy is in these public private partnerships and how we do leverage that money what are the rules of the game i don't know i'm a ranking member i don't have a clue i don't think anybody can come before us right now and tell us exactly what the rules of the game and when you're selling something like they're going to three hundred miles of i guess it is to an entity with federal money  include improving the interstate as well as maintain and operate and i don't have the specific numbers but i will get those and get back to you as i believe they were broken out in the report but i'll check back that's our major surface and mass transit of are important questions i would love your recommendations and then i'd also like to see how you could calculate where we could get towards the one point five by speeding up the process in public private partnerships are playing and transportation and districts in us and they identified a wide variety of the benefits but also talked about some of the parameters that have to be placed on those and i have listed a little earlier my testimony or my responses some parameters that i think are important but i do think that we need to take this on very quickly and get together and decide perhaps even to rule making process in the near term in advance of the next bill what are the important parameters my concern with the majority commission report is that they are as restrictions on public private partnership beyond which i felt was prudent to do and in my opinion and they're judgment for that of state and local officials i do think whether or not there's federal money and certainly when there is federal money involved there is a federal interest but whether or not there is federal money involved we do need to make sure that these roads are constructed to the operating and maintenance standards of the interstate if indeed they are on the interstate that they connect with other portions of the transportation system that they do provide mobility for people and products there conducive to interstate commerce i've listed out about a half a dozen or so requirements that i think would be prudent and have that discussion let me go to your question about how we could save and talk about what could be saved by revamping the process when i was highway administrator we needed at that point in time federalizing a project added somewhere between twelve and twenty percent to the cost and that would be if the project could be constructed in the same virtual time frame that it otherwise could be pointed out that is not the case today mr sharon mentioned when we have significant inflation in construction cost and materials well in excess of the rate of inflation in the sooner we can build these projects the better off we are because we are saving money there are federal processes that draw this down that is one of the reasons that i think is so important to narrow the federal focus to what is truly in the national interest and then let the states do the rest of the projects with the would take the federal money that might have otherwise gone to a local government because it was so much hassle for them to use federal money and substitute state money for that but we would only give them cents on the dollar because we were taking on the the process burden requirement so  that an idea of what mr i think was trying to get to in terms of how we could save money narrow the federal focus collect at the federal level only that which is attributable to federal and fire or deploy the balance to the state one of the and so they didn't take the political heat for raising and that project because it was under the cost to complete interstate system as we all know too well but out of proportion there wasn't a respect for the money because they weren't collecting it they weren't answering t citizens for collecting well you've heard my may have heard of my four hundred thirty seven day plan which is that's the plan that i propose for any replacement infrastructure project and disappointed that the federal highway administration has not called the states together to to convene department of transportation and move them in the direction of implementing vigorously i crafted for safety and completed permitting forty four weeks instead of forty four months if there is a need to improve this process we can do that but i don't accept an administration that says oh we have to speed up the process but then doesn't use the tools available in the existing law to encourage states to move ahead and to be vigorous and creative in speeding up permit approval while not in any way denigrating the environment environmental process the stork preservation reviews and the other permitting that is important or not at the end of the day i think it's important for local officials metropolitan playing organizations governors elected people like county supervisors or mayors to make a decision about where transit makes the best sense for them and then to thoughts about the changes you would like to see in terms of how cost benefits are calculated it sounds like you have some variation some ideas would be different from statute i would think today we're we're not we don't consider economic potential economic benefit of the project and i think that's one shortcoming that we don't necessarily do today that we should talk about transit oriented development for example you know sometimes it's a chicken and egg thing the trans is there first is  development occur or vice versa but the two can compliment each other substantially and i think to be able to take into consideration that type of investment especially when local officials have done the prerequisites and are looking to build in that corridor  understood absorbing a greater percentage of the cost to transit projects given that the recent budget projects a minimum four hundred billion dollars surplus not counting borrowing from social security and not counting the cost of the war it's hard for me to understand where we would get that money for transit from the general fund given that transit takes pressure off our highways thus making road traffic more  have a valid point i think we have to when we consider investments in surface transportation infrastructure across the broad range we can do that in a we can't assume that there aren't other demands on the on the on the fence there are many demands as you talked about the enti programs that are going to take an increasing share of our non defense discretionary revenues in the future so we have to look at other sources of funding and we also have to look at the opportunity cost of this money when i say the general fund i don't mean move total dependence into the general fund by any means because it certainly will not sustain that but i think for example using tax increment financing for example when we know that economic development is going to occur in order to be able to devote some or part of the revenues toward building a transit system i think certainly fair appropriate use your contribution but we all know that they're not but eventually pay for the project in itself i would be more a fan of diversifying from my home location phoenix arizona metropolitan area have to have sales tax one point six trillion dollars infrastructure deficit and we many of us are concerned that when we put the social security funds in the so called trust funds which we then immediate borrow back there's really no tangible mechanism for paying back i've actually floated the idea of investing our social security trust funds in a transportation infrastructure fund so that our people could use that money to build lasting infrastructure what's happening now is that other retirement funds from other countries are investing things i think are appropriate where the private sector will invest is frankly going to be where there is a level of congestion or a level of traffic that make it cost effective for them to do so and that's where i think this whole concept of pricing is so important where there is demand for projects based on congestion that is building or is there already today the private sector will look favorably upon those projects all of them are not going to pencil out if you will in terms of private sector investment but many of them do and those are the opportunities i think to attract private sector investment to add to what we're collecting from the public bases here today the areas where i most disagreed with the rest of the commissioners answer that first of all inclined to find  problem they largely used to improve with some additions for passenger rail and other things that add to that i think the cost to maintain is more appropriate and then supplementing that with private sector investment i think that increasing the important i think the federal role needs to be very clearly and i would argue narrowly defined so that the federal government are only taking responsibility for and funding those things which are truly in the national interest and i would observe that one hundred  and local governments have the tools they need to really analyze these road projects know that they will accomplish the goals and the and are we using some of the new technologies and modeling and simulation to really look at what th roads will do or what the transit will do in order to make sure that we're making good decisions that would be number one i also think we all agree with flexibility and giving more flexibility to the state and local governments one question i've always asked in my local government is why don't we allow businesses to contribute to a transit fund instead of requiring them to meet certain zoning requirements on parking i mean nobody is going to ride the transit if you can go park your car so i think we hurt ourselves as well and give people some of those choices i also think that other revenue sources out there that we're so hung up on gas tax and tolls and all of us are aware of john peterson in the work that he's in deep sea drilling of natural gas which would give us revenue sources back to the state and federal government as well and i'm also curious to ask the last question how you would look at other measures that give more flexibility to the states such as a bill that i have that would allow virginia to decide how to use the lanes without being tantalized we all know the works in northern virginia and they've been very very successful but in the hampton roads area we can't get people so the lane miles we could open up i think would be an incredible you know my questions about are we using new technologies are we really looking at whether our investments are working  process and not focused on performance and we need to change that we need to do these benefit analysis and as you said use technology that is available some states actually are doing that washington state that director ron ron from the  department of transportation who will testify in your next panel also has done some very good work in that area particularly with prioritizing a very innovative program to improve bridges throughout the state of missouri so i would be talking to him about that particular issue i do believe we need to have more flexibility i think silos the way we do today does not promote the highest and best use of those dollars and certainly local communities make decisions about what might be best for them where and how to spend that money all of these programs have strings attached to them they were dealing with today that we monitor today and i think there are much better ways to simplify that in terms of how to pay for it i truly think the direct user fees are the best air in the ports on our roadways and if we can price just a small portion of the population out of those periods we can get forty percent forty percent greater throughput by not letting it break down i think your   mass transportation or truck traffic then we could begin to talk about the possibility of charging for the use of a faster area to travel on in a while by the time it's done it'll be outdated if you're going to be able to work with the state and be able to promote of the infrastructure that's already there to be able to add  pricing the use of the poor at higher prices during the day during peak periods lower prices and in fact we've already seen some pretty impressive results from doing that in terms of spreading the demand out over a longer period of time so again we're getting better from the infrastructure without adding infrastructure which as you said is very difficult to do in those areas i know that there are some environmental concerns you and i have talked about that that we certainly need to continue to deal with and i think your suggestion of perhaps an overhead structure that at brown and i think you make such a good point back in one hundred fifty years when the interstate system was laid out it was laid out to connect america's major cities together but it also was reflective of what the economy was and what freight patterns were at that point in time what we're seeing today is changes in those patterns freight is moving in different routes i mentioned the port of charleston panama panama canal expansion things like that in the southeast for example where textiles and tobacco used to be the  major portions of the economy today that is not the case it's high tech it's a variety of other things so the interstate as laid out originally served a very good purpose for its time but isn't necessarily where operating the way we needed to do today i think an important passenger vehicle commuting going on we're very interested in how we can improve our surface transportation system i'm pleased to see that the commission included emissions reductions and environmental responsibility among the county i found it to be this is actually a savings and that savings and and to improve their air quality and so on and house has a lot of public support and to see as i'm about this would it be consistent with his approach to use transportation funds to support the purchase and development of hybrid buses engine locomotive translates that are either hybrids or run on biofuels or both societally infrastructure and other new transportation technologies congestion improve the air quality in fact some studies have indicated that if we were able to implement the program the mayor bloomberg has advocated in new york city it would have the same effect as an entire world in terms of fuel economy the difference is where it goes it doesn't go into programs that help us develop our new transportation technologies goes to wherever the oil companies decide to invest it which is usually perpetuating the same energy use that they are already profiting from but public period the opportunity for the public good common to be involved in project development because at the end of the day they are going to live with these projects and so they i think that we have to be very careful not to circumvent the opportunity for that involvement while streamlining but i think we can do bo thank you very much and thank you for your work with the commission and i just want to comment that when i was stuck in a traffic jam coming down yesterday to catch the a solo which was the rest of my trip and the best part of my trip to washington my hybrid turned off  chairman thank you madam secretary for being here today i think there's there's no dispute that we've got to find money to invest in infrastructure in this country you know across the country across the political spectrum i think everybody agrees that the debate i guess we're having is where do we get it i think sometimes as republicans we have a knee jerk reaction against whether it's the taxes or not to do any of them and again not that you're taking a position against all of them but as i talk to my colleagues you know some of them are against polling some of them are against congestion pricing some against raising the gas tax and none of those solutions are perfect solutions finding finding the money but again as  republicans i think it's important to point out that we have a role laid out in the constitution whether it's for national security maintaining post roads or interstate commerce all those clearly state that we have a role as a federal government to participate in a national transportation system and it's the core of our global competitiveness we've got to have the roads to to get to the ports to ship our goods overseas and ship goods into america so it really restrictions on where and how funding can be used from tolling the funding can be used for service on a facility for the operation maintenance and upkeep of the facility it can go to a reasonable rate of return assuming there's a private sector investor a private party involved in the transaction but it cannot be moved and used off it has to be used them on that facility for the reasons roughly that i outlined and i will follow up with you with a very specific response of everything involved in where and how and other series of votes i know your time is precious the last few questions and just back to the issue where you talked about all the additional money we're spending i guess i at the time i didn't raise the point but i would like to raise a point we have here a very interesting study called twenty years behind smart investments in minnesota's transportation infrastructure and i got a little bit of my question previously where i asked would you even look at indexing the existing gas tax so that at least its contribution would maintain at the current inadequate level and you demurred on that in this case what they did is they looked back twenty years ago and over twenty years in minnesota they took all the federal money they took all of the state money and they just did it for two things inflation purchasing power and vehicle miles traveled and today's federal investment in minnesota in terms of real dollars on the ground because of construction cost inflation and vehicle miles traveled is one half of what it was twenty years ago so i guess i come to a different conclusion when you say gee we're investing this vast amount more money and it's failing us no we're not really in real dollars and in the growth of use of the system we're investing at about half the rate we did twenty years ago and i think that you know sort of a basic fallacy of this premise that some of the money is already beat the mass amount of money is being spent in efficiently there is no vast amount of money being spent we're spending less than two percent of our g d p on all our infrastructure china is spending nine  you know we are not keeping up here and i guess i just feel strongly that when we talk about the money that i believe there is a significant continuing federal role and you don't i guess have a question about the sixty forty or the twelve eighteen cents where is transit fit into that transit come out of the twelve cents that would be retained for the federal government would give the other six cents back to the states mr sharon actually differentiated sixty percent to highway roads and bridges a good person which can be flex by the way twenty percent to transit so we have a twenty percent factor that we might be able to look at simplification and i'm also for more efficiency we did have standards or changes and environmental standards after incredible amount of work in safety lou and to the best my knowledge there is no rule implementing those changes that we thought would streamline the process create more efficient deeper federal programs can we expect a rule to implement those sometime chairman i will go back and look into that i don't know where it is right now but i can assure you that was a very high priority for me we w together that would be great because the clocks tick and then it's been a few years if i could on another point which was raised like your member was raising but someone we had here was oh it was mr barrett i believe transit oriented development we had quantify the economic benefits of transit oriented development in fact he believes that they can prove that with the federal investment is made that the benefits are so high that ultimately the federal government is going to more than recapture its small investment but somehow the federal transit ministration is unable to quantify the economic benefit and follow somehow someone who's arguably represents a group pretty far to the right feels the investment can be justified and can be measured and the department can figure that out and i want to make sure that i speak accurately sum i tell you what i know based on my knowledge of this issue and i'll get back to you on the record the process by which these projects are evaluated today does not allow that comparison to be made it is an issue that i have talked about at length and believe it would be appropriate to be able to include the back to i just like for people to either follow up or not follow up but when we had mr duvall in life year and we pointed out that you put up on your web site this sort of model legislation for p  particularly problematic i mean we had the star ninety one problem in california where the state had to buy the road back to do what they said was the improvements that the vendors said was violating the non compete clause as i pointed out to the folks from indiana if let's just say we had a proposal from a big company base that was looking at coming to oregon or going to australia and there were some transit issues transportation issues and what i put in the end as they said you know you can't build and if you have someone in the middle of in the lower value farmland wanted to build a huge industrial project and you were competing with australia you would have to go to mcquery from australia and get them get their permission to build the interchange i mean you've lost control of the asset and or your transportation system and within ten miles either side of it you can't build anything that would compete with with that road i mean i think there are some pitfalls here and we can disagree on the margins but i think some  basis to move forward with some parameters to establish what is in the federal or the public interest yeah they do say here in the g a o report page ten secretary transfer and should direct the federal highway minister clarify federal aid highway regulations on the methodology for determining excess toll revenue quoting reasonable rate of return to private investors and highways public private partnerships involve federal investment they go on to say congress should consider directing the secretary of transportation consultation with congress to de develop and submit to congress objective criteria for identifying national public interests and highways public private partnerships i agree and in fact i don't know that we have to wait for you to direct this we will go ahead and start working on five votes and so the committee will stand in recess until those five votes and then we'll take up the mikes and i'll thank you  public affairs conway proceed thank you mr chairman members of the committee i'm ron director of the missouri department of transportation and president of ash though thank you for this opportunity to provide the perspective of state d o t is on the report of the national surface transportation policy and revenue study commission asheville commands this committee for establishing the commission and we are proud that one of  laci secretary of the wisconsin department of transportation served on the commission through the testimony of our members in a series of reports ashville provided substantial input into the commission in may two thousand and eight we convene transportation leaders and that would be may two thousand and seven we convene we convene transportation leaders from around the nation in a transportation vision for the twenty first century summit the resulting vision document was cosigned by twenty one national transportation organizations much of that input has been reflected in the commission's report we believe the commission got the big ideas right including the need for fundamental reform of the federal transportation program the need for significant additional investment a strong federal role and a shared funding responsibility by federal state and local governments the need for a multi modal approach with greater emphasis on transit in inner city passenger rail and increase in federal revenues be it through fuel taxes or other means the need to transition to an alternative revenue source twenty years from now greater  tolls and public private ventures to supplement revenues at the state and local levels systematic planning to guide investment to where it is most needed a performance based program accountability for results and investment focus on matters of genuine ashville interests we believe the commission was accurate in its assessment that u s needs that the us needs to invest two hundred twenty five billion dollars per year from now to twenty fifty to meet national needs today we are investing less than forty percent of that amount we also believe they were correct in their assessment that the only way to increase funding to the levels needed is for all levels of government to continue to fund their share state and local governments even with the aid of private partnerships will not be able to meet national investment needs without a strong federal partner with the explosion of international trade and the expansion of the global economy we must improve the reliability of our freight system for interstate commerce now more than ever we need a strong federal partner with the continuing growth of this nation and the concentration of population in urban areas that produce eighty six per cent of our nation's g d p we must reduce congestion so that people and freight can move freely now more than ever we need a strong federal partner the commission called for reform of the federal program to ensure that that it is performance space accountable and focused on issues of true national significance they call for restructuring the program to address ten priorities preservation for a metropolitan to justin safety connecting with rural america inner city passenger rail environment energy federal lands and research we want to work with congress to make sure that these reforms are implemented in ways that can work at the state level and also to craft programatic solutions that meet the needs of all of our states large and small rural and urban we agree with the commission that it takes too long to deliver transportation projects in the reforms must be instituted to speed project delivery when congress first proposed the idea of creating the national commission one of its fundamental questions was whether it could continue to rely on the federal fuel tax is the main source of revenue to support the highway trust fund we find it instructive that the commission determined that the phil tax will continue to be a viable source of funding but that a transition to an alternative such as of t tax will be needed by the year two thousand and twenty five it will be up to congress to determine how to sustain the solvency of the highway trust fund and how to increase future revenues so that the federal share of the surface transportation funding can be increased to the levels needed we are depending on the senate and house to find ways to avert the immediate funding crisis pending this year so this states receive highway entrancing funding at the levels guaranteed in the safety lou when these programs come up for a all they're safe in two thousand and nine and last congress finds ways to sustain highway and transcend funding over the short run states will face a dramatic cut in their highway and transit programs frankly over the longer term both the federal government and the states most must step up to the plate with additional funding to meet current and future demands on the highway and transit infrastructure as one way to help ashville propose the creation of a national brac commission with limited responsibility to adjust user fees user be ready to the highway trust fun transportation association the m t a history is one of disinvestment in the fifty's sixty's and seventy's it left us in dire straits and in the last ten or twelve or twenty years we've spent over sixty billion dollars to rebuild the system and we in the process we reclaimed what was a regional national treasure the numbers from that investment the reinvestment that system has spoken for themselves are ridership over the last ten years is up nearly fifty percent in fact we are seeing riders that we haven't seen since one thousand nine hundred eighty two before everyone had a car in their garage or on time performance is up from the low eighty percent into the upper ninety percent are mean distance between failure is down our bridge and tunnel traffic faster than it ever had moved before because of investments in technologies and when we talk to our customers they tell us it's because of the improvements and the investments that we've made in the reliability and performance of our system none of that would be possible without a strong commitment from new york new york city  our other local partners and of course mr chairman the federal government and we're grateful for their continued stable support and so that's why the work of the commission holds such relevance and resonance for the m t a and for my transit colleagues that after their work was thorough and they clearly drew a link between a successful and internationally competitive u s and the investments needed to improve our national infrastructure they also understand that if we retreat on investing in that infrastructure or if we do only the bare minimum will exacerbate what we call our growing crisis of capacity in terms of our system as populations grow over the next twenty years and our systems are operating at capacity today either scenario would leave us at a competitive disadvantage in the global marketplace as europe and asia continue to invest i found some of the comments about asia and the folks who are visiting here in washington very interesting this morning we have had no less than eight to twelve systems visit us in the last year five of which were from china beijing shanghai and others who are building systems in the next five years or surpass the system that it took us one hundred years to build so there is some pretty significant national competitive issues at play we naturally like the fact the commission calls for a bold approach and reinforces a strong federal role and we also particularly like the fact that they believe that transit has the pivotal role in a balanced intermodal system we like the idea of performance measures increased efficiencies improved product delivery and even private participation they are all good areas to explore but as we know from past perience none of those alone or perhaps even collectively will solve the transportation problems or adequately address the magnitude of the need they are just too great substantial immediate and real investment is needed now let me turn my attention to a few of the areas highlight in the commission's report  quickly the report notes that public transportation infrastructure needs about thirteen billion dollars a year in investment something that will grow to twenty one to thirty four billion dollars by two thousand and twenty our own industry sees the need today at about forty billion dollars a year and so we know that the need is considerable real and growing as i mentioned earlier after we're particularly pleased that the commission calls for an expanded federal role the report notes that public transportation and intercity passenger rail will play significantly larger role in america's mobility our transit systems work symbiotically with highways to alleviate congestion allowing for more efficient transportation of passengers and goods and the inter relationship is readily acknowledged by our partners at ashdown the chamber of commerce and others with whom we work and it will continue to be critical as our population and economy grow one thing we find particularly troubling as i wrap up mr chairman is we're troubled that some people see the public investment transportation as a drag on the federal budget or the economy rather than the catalyst it certainly has been a catalyst in the new york area with many transit systems and we believe that there is continued return on investment maybe they don't show up on the balance sheets of transistors them but they certainly show up on the balance sheets of companies throughout the country i'll wrap my remarks up thank the committee and i'd be happy to answer questions as we go forward  mr chairman and members of the committee thank you very much for the opportunity to testify today my name is randy mollett vice president of government relations and public affairs for conway ank i'm testifying today on behalf of the u s chamber of commerce last fall the chamber testified in front of this committee that there is abundant evidence that america's infrastructure is not only showing its age but also showing that it lacks capacity to handle the growing volume of people and goods that are moving today we wholeheartedly agree with the commission that continued under investment and business as usual transportation policies and programs will have a detrimental effect on on the united states competitiveness and on the everyday lives of all americans to avoid these dire predictions and to meet the needs of the economy of the future the next era in service transportation will require a multi modal and intermodal approach that will ensure u s competitiveness in the global economy this is a name that emphasizes the need for the federal government to play an important role although every level of government will need to step up to the plate is the federal government the bears primary responsibility to ensure that infrastructure investment is better aligned to support our national interests economic growth personal mobility interstate commerce and foreign trade the chamber is pleased to see that the commission calls for a transportation system that explicitly values freight movements on a typical day about forty three million tons of goods valued at twenty nine billion dollars move newly twelve billion tons miles on the nation's interconnected transportation network according to the federal highway administration without new strategies to increase capacity congestion may impose an unacceptably high cost on the nation's economy and productivity we also agree with the commission that metropolitan congestion relief and small city and rural connectivity deserve national focus and research resources increasingly congestion imposes additional costs on employees and employers alike state and local chambers of commerce kno well their communities need transportation choices and those options are a valid aspect of economic development strategies the chamber commands the commission for its strong statements on the need to speed project delivery it is appalling that major highway projects take approximately thirteen years to advance from project initiation to completion regulatory red tape and lawsuits can bring even the most common sense improvements to a grinding halt we concur with the commission that it is possible and indeed essential to speed project delivery while adequately addressing environmental and community impacts this must be a top priority in the next authorization when it comes to funding and financing every option must be considered to address the enormous needs of our nation's transportation infrastructure as a nation we must face this fundamental fact we cannot separate transport growth from economic growth we are growing people in a growing country with aging infrastructure we must fix what we have and if we want to new road a new runway or a new transit system we must pay for it additionally while chronic under investment is a major contributor to problems across all modes of transportation the chamber encourages congress to examine ways to spend infrastructure dollars more wisely we must address a diversion of funding away from intended uses and the lack of resources prior to the station that mark many federal transportation programs the public must have confidence that transportation programs will deliver real solutions to real problems or they will not support increased investment in any form and conclusion last fall when the chamber presented testimony to the full transportation and infrastructure committee if pledge to engage the business community through the let's rebuild america campaign the chamber's follow through on that pledge by waging a battle in the media to make infrastructure a core national economic priority by a data file and regulations that get in the way of private investment and by speaking out on the need for increased public investment the release of the commission's report all transportation and infrastructure stakeholders have started coming to the table working together we're going to put an end to the intermural squabbles that have traditionally divided these stakeholders we're going to rally and unite around an urgent compelling mission to rebuild america thank you very much for the opportunity to be here today i look forward to answering any questions that you will have a quick round of questions i'll direct mine mr on plane pricing discussion that we had earlier and private public partnerships where you know even the commission leans fairly heavily at least for their lower number on congestion pricing and obviously secretary peters puts all of our eggs in the you know congestion pricing and five private public partnership tolling basket you know as secretary of state department transportation could you i mean what how much do you think this would help your state with your problems no more federal investment federal that's been frozen and declining because of the cost of construction real dollars and we're now given you license to go out there and do congestion  a very limited one from the standpoint of actually being able to address all of our problems the missouri system and i'm not speaking on behalf of asheville at this point it's the we have two hundred  sixty five miles of our thirty thirty two thousand miles of system that we're responsible for two hundred sixty five miles carry twenty percent of our traffic i have twenty seven thousand miles that carry twenty percent of our traffic and so obviously public private partnerships are not a solution to twenty seven thousand miles of my system but they might very well apply to those very few roads that carry a lot of traffic and so i believe both from from the state of missouri and i would also add that the position of ash though is is that public private partnerships do have a role but it is a relatively small role that it might represent somewhere between seven eight nine percent of the resources we need available to us but it is not this it's not the silver bullet that is going to solve the problems of transportation so you don't think a private public partnership pricing model is particularly viable for those twenty seven thousand miles of not heavily populated and utilized road area that's correct one other quick question and i was puzzled you know we were trying to gather some part is that i was puzzled because i thought sort of the no brainer is we got to fix the trust fund issue and we heard that the caliph the california department of transportation the commission they have a paper they're written saying not one smidgen of the impact of the trust fund goes into deficit in the state of california i mean how about as there are any other states in that position and or do you think that's a credible thing for california to say  wouldn't comment on on california's view i don't know what the facts are that drove them to that conclusion i can tell you that he heard from many other states who feel like that i i have i have not there might be one or two other states that are in a position to have a view that it would have a minimal impact on them but the fact is that that that my estimate would be that forty five states if if we see a forty five fifty percent budget requirements everything and i mean if we looked out into next year saying you know the money might not be there to finish this project we better not i mean when there be some people who wouldn't initiate projects this year because of that uncertainty that the federal program given the deficit for two thousand and ten might very well be a twenty billion dollars program instead of the current forty three that we have already adjusted our step and it's devastated in two thousand and ten to see the program or the projects that are now being shoved to the side in jest in the event that in fact federal funding does go away and it's going to have a noticeable impact  would you you know i raised an issue with the secretary about essentially what freezing the gas tax means in terms of the diminished buying about to use the example of the wisconsin study over time would do you would be prudent i mean not even getting into increasing you know saying ok let's look at it it wouldn't least be prudent to index the gas tax to the cost there again our history at the m t a is that we present the program as need and the political environment determines what it is but i will tell you that the need has grown dramatically in new york and and throughout the transit industry and we definitely need a new and dedicated and predictable source of revenue the most immediate one that comes to mind is the existing revenue stream sent this fall the chamber has gone on record as saying that they would support reasonable increases i don't believe that we have tied that to a specific index they have tied those reasonable increases to be more certain that the projects that they would be funding would have national significance and would not be diverted off into things that didn't meet that criteria mr boyle and somehow your agency is able to quantify economic impact from your investments in transportation association do have models that show that we really model model i mean like in a computer and stuff we can plug in some assumptions and you come up with a suite we created one back in the one nine hundred eighty s along with the port know we don't see the chamber wanting to talk about any increases in taxes or fees unless they're expecting something reasonable the result to your constituents your membership do you mean do you think there are measurable impact such as those mr boyle has laid out from transit investment that benefit the larger business community and the value property and i think that there is great evidence that supports those conclusions there's also i think even more evidence that supports the downside for not making those investments so what were we look there are like the numbers on  our last in terms of just in time delivery or hours laws by individuals in terms of being caught judged and that's what you're talking about i think there's plenty of that kind of evidence that's been found so if you know the secretary or at least the department at an earlier hearing said that they measured i think she said no minority report actually because a condition of two hundred billion dollars a year if if indeed that that's a little higher than most other as a myth but if it's that high that if they eliminated our system would have to build fifteen extra lanes on the long island expressway just to handle the current traffic so we know that we're doing something that helps alleviate potential congestion in our region certainly the region could not survive i had sixteen lanes on the so i think we know there's a connection and i think given on the frame given the framework that you have established the cost benefit in that is pretty obvious if you'll indulge me for a second i'll put on my trucking hat for a minute and i will put forth that the highway system is our assembly line that we must use but have no authority to improve or invest in ourselves so we're hopeful that by looking at these things you all will make a determination that wherever the funding comes from that investment certainly is necessary if we're going to continue to allow ourselves to grow thank you  appears that would be and again i thank you for your time and we look forward to a better transportation future jointly together but if the commission would have us move to cost a complete scenario the successful grant agreements may be discontinued what is your opinion of the value of n f f g a and i have a particular interest in this as you may be aware that  the city and county of honolulu is one of the new start projects on the books well i think there needs to there needs to be an overhaul of sorts for the new start process if you will whether the cost to complete is the accurate alternative or not i don't think i'm prepared to to comment on that but i will tell you that the process of getting a full funding granted and the hurdles that one has to go through for what are in many instances on their face wise local decisions good investments for federal dollars and the like the process  is burdensome laborious are we just going to full funding grant agreements in the last two years both of which took anywhere from eight to nine years to complete in that eight or nine years the cost of the  be a better way to do so and we're very happy to work with the committee to kind of construct something new but something has to be done to change that because if you speed that product delivery save time and money and at the end of the day we want to deliver such a system would develop and maintain a national to move interstate commerce i believe that there is a strong role for private sector there's a strong role for local and state governments but the primary to ninety seven go around  the subcommittee will come to order the chair will ask all members staff and everyone to turn electronic devices off or on vibrate the subcommittee is meeting today to hear testimony on runway safety i will give a brief opening statement and then yield to the ranking member mr p tried for his opening statement or any remarks he may have and then we will go to our first panel of witnesses i welcome everyone to our hearing today on runway safety while the united states has the safest air transportation system in the world we can't rely on our be satisfied with our past success we must continue to strive for greater success because want to accident report on runway on ramp safety which chairman oberstar and i requested we were hear from dr delling ham and others concerning the g a o report according to the g a o the rate of runway incursions and fiscal year two thousand and seven increased to six point zero five and sedans per million operations this is a twelve percent increase over two thousand and six and the highest since two thousand and one when the rate rate six point one incidence per million operations while the number of severe runway incursions dropped from fifty three and sedans in two thousand and one to twenty four in two thousand and seven in the first quarter of fiscal year two thousand and eight alone there have been tens of very runway incursions this is simply unacceptable the g a o has stated that the lack of leadership on this issue including a director level vacancy in the office of runway safety for over two years an out of date national runway safety plan has impeded further progress while the f a a has finally filled its runway safety office director position this subcommittee wants to know what the plan the is on a national level to improve one runway say to ensure this issue remains at the forefront of the f a a safety agenda i want the f a a to provide a progress report to the subcommittee every three months detailing each category a and b runway incursion how the f a a responded and what progress is being made to address these incidents and reduce the overall number of runway incursions o also cited controller fatigue as a major factor in runway safety and i am interested in hearing more from our witnesses including mr path for a the president of the national air traffic controllers association on this issue around the country controllers are working longer hours to handle increasingly congested runways and airspace in part because of staffing shortages while the f a a may not admit that there is a problem i can assure you after talking to all of the users of the system there is a problem in addition to that tends to vary runway incursions in the first quarter of fiscal year two thousand and eight there was also a near miss at the chicago center in december of two thousand and seven this should serve as a wakeup call to the aviation community that something something needs to be done to avoid a major disaster in the near future human factors will always be a challenge but with enough redundancy worked into the system using technologies like the ones we will hear about today we will be able to mitigate their effects i am interested in learning more about near and long term technologies such as as runway safety lights and low cost surveillance systems in h r twenty eight eighty one the f a a reauthorization act two thousand and seven which pass the house of representatives on september twentieth of two thousand and seven and has yet to be acted on by the senate we included provisions to address runway safety h r twenty eight eighty one provides forty two million dollars over four years for one runway incursion reduction programs and seventy four million dollars over four years for runways status light acquisition and installation further requires the administrator to submit a report to congress containing a strategic runway safety plan and a plan for the installation and deployment of systems to alert controllers and flight crews to potential runway incursions safety must not be compromised in an effort to save  money because of a lack of resources or attention the f a a and the aviation community must do better i assure you that this committee will keep the speed to the bar to keep safety efforts on track the american traveling traveling public deserve nothing less with that i will recognize our ranking member for his opening statement but before i do i ask unanim consent to allow two weeks for all members to revise and extend their remarks and to permit the submission of additional statements and materials by members and witnesses without objection so ordered this time the chair recognizes the ranking member mr  runway safety we're occur early in the safest period in aviation history as long as human beings endeavor to take to the skies there'll always be the potential for human error and for accidents but the federal aviation administration this subcommittee and in fact the entire aviation community are charged with ensuring the safest national airspace system that's humanly possible the recent government accountability office report studied runway incursions as well as runway and ramp safety and found that while the rate for most serious categories of runway incursions is down from last year twenty four events out of sixty one million aircraft operations there was an anomalous uptick in runway incursions in the first quarter of this year therefore we need to remain vigilant in our oversight of this of this issue looking forward to hearing about the steps of the federal aviation administration to airports airlines pilots avionics manufacturers general aviation users and controllers are taking to reduce the risk for these potentially deadly runway incursions i believe that there are many ways to address runway safety clearly there's no silver bullet to eliminate runway incursions and i'm interested in hearing about the many technolog currently deployed to reduce runway incursions as well as those that are under development and may be deployed before law technologies such as runway status lights as d low cost surface surveillance all have the potential to drastically reduce the instances of runway incursions in addition to technological innovations i'm interested in hearing about the bricks and mortar type crushable concrete engineered materials arrestor systems have been installed the twenty one airports have proven effective increased painted markings and signage improvements at airports are also under way and around perimeter taxiways have been installed a lad has airport reducing runway crossings from roughly six hundred fifty to less than one hundred per day the federal aviation administration is currently evaluating these approaches and i'm interested in hearing from our witnesses what they think about these strategies and from the federal aviation administration on their plan to deploy these and other measures beyond the flashing lights radar alerting systems and concrete it's important that we address human factors issues that affect runway safety pilot little organise and situational awareness are critical to safe flight also as we seek to get more information to pilots it's important that we strike a balance that does not overload or distract them although the national transportation safety board is not cited controller fatigue as a factor causing runway incursions that they've investigated last summer's tragic incidents in lexington kentucky some of cited controller fatigue as an area of concern and i'm interested in hearing about these concerns as well however as with all runway safety issues it's critical that this discussion be based upon data and science we must be cautious when discussing safety to avoid just raising extraneous issues otherwise we won't achieve the safety benefits that we're all seeking finally i'm interested in hearing about the f a s call to action on runway safety the agency has clearly taken steps to address this issue but it will be important to keep their programs on schedule and to continue to maintain the vigilant oversight that we're seeing now the number of entertainment projected to rise and a corresponding increase in runway incursions would be absolutely unacceptable so i appreciate the efforts of all of our witnesses to address this important safety issue and i look forward to your testimony with the chair thanks the ranking member and at this time will introduce our first panel of witnesses as you may know have noted we have two panels of witnesses today the first panel dr gerald dillingham who is no stranger to this subcommittees testified before our subcommittee many times and i've referred to him in our statement concerning the runway safety report  the vice chairman of the national transportation safety board and the honorable calvin scoville was inspector general for the u s department of transportation gentlemen on our first panel we normally adhere to the five minute rule but  safety testimony this afternoon to find and describe some key types of encourage and second we will present the key findings of the g a o study and finally we will offer some suggestions for actions that we think can be undertaken to address the problem regarding the nature of incursions a runway incursion is generally defined as an incident that occurs on the airfield when one aircraft comes to close to another vehicle or person it is not generally considered an aviation accident but many aviation safety experts consider incursions as precursors or early warning of accidents incursions going to occur in several ways one of the more typical scenarios is shown here illustrating the path of two aircraft that are proceeding towards intersecting runways a second very typical scenario is one in which an aircraft attempts to land as a second aircraft taxis onto an active runway runway incursions a categorized in terms of severe based on the distance between aircraft and the possibility of a collision categories are the most serious types as both of these categories indicate near collisions the simulation you're about to see is an actual serious incursion that occurred july eleventh two thousand and seven at the fort lauderdale hollywood airport in this simulation you will see a delta seven five seven nearly touch down on a runway these aircraft missed each other by less than one hundred feet this next simulation illustrates the type of incursion that occurs when an aircraft attempts a landing on an occupied runway this is this this incursion occurred on july fifth two thousand and seven at the denver international airport you will see a front here airlines a three nineteen having to conduct a go around procedure after seeing another jet on the runway report and i study we look back at incursions for ten years we found that the total number of all categories of of incursions peaked in two thousand and one at four hundred seven between two thousand and two and two thousand  the total number of encourages declined and was relatively flat this relatively flat line still indicates that there was at least one incursion someplace in the u s every day in two thousand and seven the overall incur rate peaked again and was nearly as high as the two thousand and one peak the next this next graph shows only the serious incursions this is categories a and b there are two key points that can be taken from this data first the number of serious incursions follows a similar pattern as overall incursions with a significant drop in two thousand and two and a relative down which ran in two thousand to two thousand and six when there were thirty one serious incur discraft also shows a twenty four percent drop in the number of serious incursions from two thousand and six to two thousand and seven the second point is that about one third of the serious incursions involve at least one commercial aircraft each of represents a potential catastrophic accident as this next graphic illustrates this is a problem that will require sustained attention it shows that in the first quarter of this year there were ten serious incursions this is five times the number of serious incursions from the same time period from the previous year with regard to the cause of incursions a study found that over half were attributed to pilot error slightly more than a quarter were caused by controllers oftentimes involving some kind of control of miscommunication between the pilot and the controllers about fifteen percent involved a vehicle or protest in the air such as a service truck entering an active runway turning now to the initiatives to address the incursion problem as mr peatross said there are no silver bullets and as long as they are humans in the loop there will probably never be zero incursions we think that a multifaceted layer approach has the best chance of minimizing the problem among the initiatives that we consider to be done immediately to continue the effort that f e m a has underway including the training improving airport signage and markings and individual airport reviews with stakeholders second develop and implement the national runway safety plan third address human factors issues such as control over time and fatigue issues and adopt international standards for control of communications and for accelerate the technological remedy such as runway status lights low cost service surface surveillance systems and the deployment of as dx in addition we think that initiatives such as the development of a confidential reporting system should be expedited and to the extent it is operationally feasible runway crossing should be minimized for the longer term include making infrastructure such as the will hear the audible warning to the pilot about an approaching converging on the converging runway require actions that must be sustained temporary reduction in the number of incursions thank you thank you dr dillingham we will have a chance to come back and ask questions concerning not only your power point but other issues in the report but let me quickly ask you a couple of questions before we move on to mr khodorkovsky the fort lauderdale incident where the aircraft came within one hundred feet of each other was that pilot error was that control or i don't know the answer that i but i'll get back to you ok the second incident in denver where the one plane had to go around th subcommittee i am a chief operating officer of the air traffic organization with me today is jim a logjam those are director of white sand standard service specifically working on the pilots side of th honored to be here today to discuss ways that everyone can work together to improve runway safety and f a a safety is our top imperative while two thousand and seven was the safest year yet for aviation we remain focused to make the safest system in the world even safer runways stay fifty starts with running runway incursions whether these mistakes are made by pilots controllers or ground staff our most recent efforts have made a difference we have reduced serious runway incursions by fifty five percent since two thousand and one the next chart breaks down last year as runway incursions by severity you will notice a change in october when the f a a adopted the new international definition from when we began counting every single mistake on the runway or even if another craft was not present this was not previously done and it appears that the incursions are actually rising dramatically actually what we're doing is we're counting more incursions so we can understand  the risks better so by getting this additional data of actually treating every single event as a serious issue to look at i think we have a better shot at sussing our safety risk the f a a investigates every runway incursions so we can understand what causes it as you heard pilot error accounts for approximately sixty percent right now air traffic control air around thirty percent and the remaining ten to fifteen by ground staff the call to action for runway safety which started last summer resulted in specific runway safety improvements at hundreds of airports across the nation we improved airplane airport signage and runway markings and our busiest airports have receive satellite based runway surveillance lights turn red when there's traffic on or approaching the runway runway status lights are preventing potential accidents today and in fact just last week at dallas fort worth an incursion was aborted because a pilot saw the red lights and did not enter the active runway not all measures to improve runway safety will involve installing new equipment the f a a runway safety action teams have visited twenty of the busiest airports to and identify short term fixes such as new science better markings and more importantly training for pilots controllers and ground staff our teams are headed to even more ports this year as a result of the success with these first twenty another critical component though of this program is to complete our work with napco the controllers union to implement a non punitive voluntary reporting system for air traffic controllers similar to the aviation safety action programs at the airlines in my previous role as chief safety officer for united airlines i was responsible for four such programs for pilots dispatchers mechanics and flight attendants because of this experience i am convinced that the information derived from this program will be extremely powerful in understanding the human factors involved and such the entire aviation community has a role in the in the solutions and i'm happy to report that they are stepping up to the plate i welcome the committee assistance in these efforts this concludes my remarks and i would be happy to answer any questions you may have you good afternoon chairman costello ranking ranking member p try chairman over starr members of the subcommittee thank you for the opportunity to present testimony on behalf of the national transportation safety board as you know the safety board is charged with investigating aviation accidents and incidents determining their probable cause and issuing safety recommendations to their rear currents the safety board is especially concerned about runway incursions due to their number and potential severity in fact the world's largest aviation disaster was a result of a runway incursion in that accident nine hundred seventy seven five hundred eighty three lives were lost because two jumbo jets collided on a runway the canary islands incursions occur because of human error pilots make mistakes controllers make stakes as do those driving ground vehicles so there is no single solution and two thousand the safety board made recommendations to address the issue in a variety of ways including procedural changes educational efforts and technological improvements that require a direct warning initial test results are promising and the f a a is planning to conduct tests at other airports the f a a has also promoted automatic dependent surveillance broadcast or a t s be as a method of mitigating the number and severity of runway incursions for a d s p to provide the maximum safety benefit the system should support both a t s be out and a d s p end with a t s b and surface conflict warnings are provided directly to the progress has been slow in responding to recommendations issued seven years ago further national implementation of these technologies is still years away and not all airports with passenger service would be equipped has made progress with lighting improved signage in airports but some basic improvements in air traffic control procedures are needed the safety board has several outstanding the f a a regarding clerics is given to pilots when taxiing across runways and although these recommendations mirror those contained in i k o got it internationally for implementing runway safety programs the f a a has not implemented them if they had been implemented the c accident and lexington kentucky might not have occurred we need the extra protection of additional procedures in advanced technology to compensate for human errors we strongly urge action on these critical hundred we have issued numerous recommendations regarding aviation regarding mechanics and air traffic controllers however today the f a a has taken little regulatory action regarding directly related to revising existing regulations and work scheduling practices yet is in the process of convening a working group to develop scheduling practices that minimize controller impairment due to fatigue the safety board supports these efforts and continues to believe that further action must be taken especially and issuing scientifically based duty time regulations and policies that matter most fatigue among flight crew mechanics and air traffic control operating or controlling an aircraft without adequate rest percents necessary risk to the traveling public mr chairman this completes my testimony and i'll be glad to answer questions at the appropriate time the chair thanks  concern over the rise and runway incidents a significant threat to runway safety is runway incursions any incident involving an unauthorized aircraft vehicle or person on a runway since two thousand and three the number of runway incursions has begun climbing again reaching a high of three hundred seventy in two thousand and seven a twelve percent increase over the previous year while the most serious incidents decreased from a high of sixty nine in one nine hundred ninety nine to a low of twenty four in two thousand and seven during the first three months of fiscal year two thousand and eight ten serious runway incursions occurred if that rate were to continue forty serious incursions could occur before the end of this year which would be the highest level in six years over the last ten years our work showed that a range of actions is needed to enhance the margin of safety on the nation's runway we see for specific areas where f a a and other aviation users should focus on runway safety efforts first implementing existing and new f a a systems to improve runway safety new technology is considered by many to be a key factor in the mix of solutions for improving runway safety however our work on three major f a a acquisitions for improving runway safety has shown significant concerns as to what can be effectively deployed within the next several years for example as the ground surveillance system that warns controllers of possible runway conflicts may not meet its cost and schedule goals to commission all thirty five systems for five hundred forty nine point eight million dollars by two thousand and eleven questions have arisen as to whether it will be able to deliver all the planned safety benefits such as providing alerts at intersecting runways another promising technology is runway status lights a stop light like system that alerts pilots when a runway is occupied however the system is in the very early stages development and a key issue is that it uses as the x data for its surveillance capabilities and is therefore dependent on successful full deployment of as one of the most promising technologies on the horizon is a d s b however as we testified last october s b ground infrastructure will not be in place until two thousand and thirteen and users will not be required to we equip with some of the needed avionics until two thousand and twenty next making airport specific infrastructure and procedural changes the uncertain timeline and emerging risks of f a s runway safety technologies underscore the need to explore other near term solutions several relatively low cost simple airport specific changes like better improved runway markings and lighting and procedural changes in day to day airport operations can go a long way to improve the margin of safety however as we reported in may of last year other than networking naz users had no official way to share actions that were successful at reducing runway incursions at their locations we recommended that f a a develop an automated means to share best practices among all users of the net in response f a a implemented a best practices website for runway safety in december two thousand and seven we will now see how well it's being utilized next reinvaded reinvigorating f a s national program for improving runway safety from one thousand nine hundred nine to two thousand and one runway incursions increased at alarming rates to its credit f a a then took decisive action that helped to reduce these incidents it established regional runway safety offices and initiated aggressive educational programs for pilots however we found that many of those important national initiatives waned as the number of incidents declined and f a a met its overall goals for reducing runway incursions for example f a a stablished runway safety office in two thousand and one but until august two thousand and seven it had not had a permanent director for almost three years f a a all also stopped preparing its national plan for runway safety which defined the agency's strategy and prioritized efforts to reduce runway incursions in response to our recommendations f a a has begun addressing many of these concerns in addition to hiring a permanent director for the runway safety office f a a plans to reinstate its national plan for runway safety these are good steps and the key now will be most maintaining momentum last addressing controller human factors issues through improved training as we testified last week controllers staffing and training will be key watch items over the next ten years as a begins hiring and training fifteen thousand new controllers training new controllers on human factors issues such as fatigue and situational awareness will become increasingly important as f a a begins addressing the large influx of trainees f has successfully implemented an important initiative to address this type of required training tower simulators the simulators provide controllers with a virtual replica of the tower environment using real life scenario such as day and night operations varying weather conditions and emergency situations this is an important technology for new and veteran controllers to hone their skills in conditions when runway incursions are most likely to occur that concludes my statement mr chairman i'd be happy to answer your questions  to the in fact he compliments the f a a for taking action in two thousand and one and then the report goes on to state that while the agency recognize when the ground incursions runway safety issues reached its peak in two thousand and one that the f a a took action and they focused on the problem but however as the number of incursions started to decrease the f a a took their eye off the ball went on to other issues and no longer considered it a priority until in two thousand and seven when the number of incursions reached almost two thousand and one and i think that is demonstrated very clearly by the fact that there was a vacancy in the office of director of runway safety for over two years and and the safety plan and the f a a runway safety plan clearly was outdated as dr dillingham indicated  so it's clear to me that when the f a a either recognizes a problem or someone says we have a problem and you need to address this when the f a a acts then in fact positive  can happen it's only when they take the eye off the ball the agency takes its eye off the ball that we go back and we run into these problems again i was struck last night reading your testimony mr kosky on page three that it says only eight out of twenty four serious incursions involved a commercial air flight and none of these three hundred seventy incursions resulted in a collision well most of these incursions are category c and little or no risk to the public the increase in the incursions and the fact that these serious incursions are still occurring prompting the administrator to issue a call to action on one runway safety two point one he is i question the fact that the administrator implemented a call to action because of the number of incidents i happen to believe it's because this subcommittee requested the g a o to do a report on runway safety because we were concerned and i think that prompted the but then to take action in two thousand and seven we requested chairman oberstar and i were concerned in two thousand and six and that's why we requested the report so i would say that it's more than a coincidence that we requested the report in two thousand and six and in two thousand and seven the administrator said we better take a look at this we better do something having said that what struck me in your testimony and i hope that you didn't mean it to come off this way but only twenty four serious incursions it's almost like well we have these incursions but really there was not a loss of life serious disaster isn't really that big of a deal  and you know i i just want you to know that we on the subcommittee and other in the aviation world believe that it is i happen to believe that along with runway incursions along and they've spent almost sixty percent of the allocated funds for these thirty five airports so given that fact are they going to be able to reach their goal of thirty five airports given the fact that they've already spent sixty percent of their money  on third of the reports that they intend to acquit mr chairman it is a concern of ours not only in terms of the money spent but the time that has been  d that has taken them to put out the eleven that they have the expectation is that the rest of them can be put out and in half the time is taken to put out the few that have been put out so it's unlikely at this point at least we don't see how this can happen on the time on the budget in the schedule that it's being presented to us mr chairman with your permission i'd like to come back to your first question and give you some details on on the two simulations as the x or a mass and the probable cause according to the n t s b is that the flight crew inadvertently enter into an active runway they had missed the taxiway as they were on the on the airfield and on the on the denver incident it was a combination of things it was it was the fact that the aircraft turned onto the wrong one and the controllers could not identify them on the it was a snowy day  wrong but i think that you cited the issue of new controllers as opposed to experienced air traffic controllers who i think testified in correct me if i'm wrong that one facility you looked at where they had a small percentage of inexperienced air traffic controllers knew the job and another facility were half of the las vegas as i recall where half of the air traffic controllers were inexperienced new to the job and it was either your testimony or general scholes one of the two we have a problem in the system and we would hope that the f a a knowledge the problem and attempt to address it and i understand that our offering bonuses up to twenty four thousand dollars to retain that experience controllers but there is a problem in the system and finally before i turn turn over to my ranking member afternoon mr chairman a concern and the n t s b has properly highlighted it as a concern now for many years specifically when it comes to air traffic controllers by way of tagging as a direct or contributing factor to an aircraft incident where accident it's my understanding that n t s b has not done so although it closely examined it that question in connection with the accident lexington kentucky in august two thousand and six controller staffing in the tower at that incident and the degree of rest of the sole controller on duty at the time of that accident were factors that with is n t s b is recommendations to f a a that they undertake these actions first that they reduce the potential for controller fatigue by revising controller work scheduling policies and practices and that they modify their shift rotations and second that they develop a feat but to go awareness and countermeasures training program for controllers mr chairman it seems to us that there's a lot of bickering between controllers and the agencies regarding overtime and whether it contributes to fatigue it seems to me at least a matter within common human experience that if any individual works long hours at a tough and demanding job that individual to get on with it mister finally let me ask you to respond to what what is the agency doing you indicate your testimony that pilot error accounts for fifty five percent of runway incursions according to your   these issues very seriously as i did at my airline before coming to the one thing you cannot ever do is let up on safety you have to constantly keep pressure on them at all times which means well running safety programs data driven data collection programs involvement by everybody involved in the system and that's what we're trying to construct with the program with the controllers which we hope  ding and the data that we're getting from the pilot community in those programs as well as well as some of the other reporting mechanisms through the commercial aviation safety team assayas work which is going to be kind of a center point for f a a and the user community to look at data and look for leading indicators we're doing some very sophisticated technical logical work with miter and some others to actually break some new frontiers in this area more immediately though on the pilot side the call to action last august was also recently supplemented by the administrator acting administrator calling the c e o s chief operating officers of all the airlines to array's their  that the issue is still a concern to us and with the support of the highest level of those corporations the directors of safety and the directors of flight operations at those airlines are working on some programs i'll have jim talk about  major carriers we came together and myself and my deputy personally did sessions with the c e o the executives from the airline and we had first of all we talked about the issue showed the data to establish why they were there and to establish the concerns the f a a has we all should have as an industry together to face the issues regarding runway incursions it was  focused primarily on the pilot deviation aspects so these are errors made by the pilots and as hank said sixty percent of the incursions involve pilots and in some capacity so we brought the executives together and we asked them we showed them the data we then went through eleven simulations or examples of some of which you saw here today and we asked them to think about what it is we could do in the short the crew was doing a checklist item with the flight controls that was a distraction so we've asked the carriers to go back and look at their checklists and revise and identify any distractions  asked them to stress the issue of runway incursions and we continue to look for new ways to also to reach pilots and provide more data to them as well as i thank you and mr koski i appreciate your commitment to never letting you know there are as i said there has been evidence that the f a a has moved on to other priorities in the past and we're pleased to have you in the position that you are in and committed to not letting up with that i would recognize the ranking member mister thank you very much mr chairman and i wondered if i'm going to spend my time there number of other members who will be asking broader questions but  senators in wisconsin my colleague and more dr kagan who's a member of this committee from my state of wisconsin and several other representatives have been sending letters and raising concerns about changes in control of the airspace involving the air traffic control unit and i really want to if i could mr chairman have permission to submit questions from representative moore and myself for formal response after this hearing without objection and then also to ask  which adds some eighty four thousand eight thousand four hundred square miles to the so called in route aircraft flying through the airspace controlled by the milwaukee unit and i wonder if you could spend a minute describing the planning process for this airspace absorption and whether the controllers involved were informed or involved in the planning process and also what kind of training the controllers have received or will receive to effect this change and also could you broadly describe what training staffing and equipment needs f a a has to provide to ensure that when the switch takes place you will not be compromised in any way and if there are any benefits from this change if you could address those we'd appreciate it as well this is of concern obviously in our region in and out of that region and of course as ever in the aviation aware that a lot of people fly through that reconstruction and as a result of that airspace changes are needed to accommodate the evolution of the space terminations was made to give milwaukee more air space to control which is is the  issue i'm going to commit first of all that we will do it safely we will make sure that we are monitoring the safety of the transition when it occurs and again we're not going to let up on that in terms of training we've sent people all here to actually observe the operation of battle space that actually is being controlled by chicago right now so quite a few of the members from milwaukee have gone down to zero here to actually observe how to control traffic  one day classroom training sessions there are nine simulations and the radar laboratory that we provide to the controllers part of the training initially will be seven qualified people to man the new positions when we turn the switch they in turn will get the other controllers the training and transition that they need to successfully work so we have a plan we believe it's a good plan we believe it's a safe plan and we're going to execute on that not be happy to give you the details in a written response thank you very much the chair now recognizes the gentle lady from california ms richardson yes thank you m included we did bring c d s with that presentation and i don't know if it got included or not ok if we could thank you my second question is what is the air traffic controllers at a major airport i really couldn't answer that at this point but we could certainly provide for the record maybe mr goodchild might be in a better position to answer that i'd like it in writing for this committee because i think when i listen i see a lot of this going legislation perspective i think one of the reasons why we're getting some action is i had mentioned earlier concerning the g a o report in the attention of the administrator on this issue is because the subcommittee is beginning to provide aggressive oversight on these issues and that is the best function that we can perform here and that is to make sure that the f a a and everyone in the in the aviation industry that they are doing their job but in particular the f as i indicated i think that is an indication and we're not here to beat up on mr koski has not been with the agency that long but you know if this runway safety was a priority for the f they would not have left that position open for two years and they would not i have an outdated runway safety plan one of the reasons why i think kicked into gear now is because we're providing the oversight devolved runway safety down to the various lines of business and down further from headquarters and our response to that was that may be ok but if there's no national strategy or national plan you have a situation where different parts of the agency or different regions may be doing things differently and more importantly than that the lessons that could be learned from good practices were not being shared on a national we actually look at the rest the complexity of the operations the operational tempo at that airport how many runways and taxiways because we believe prioritized in terms of safety risk not kind of a historical incident that's an important component but it's not the only component well the rest of my question thank you thanks general idea now recognizes gentleman from north carolina famous chairman good to have you all congressman coble it's a two part answer the controller likely was pretty we found that he had slept approximately two hours and twenty four hours prior to the accident however in the n a revised its controller work scheduling policies and practices in order to provide rest periods that are long enough to obtain so efficient restored of next that f a a modified rotations for controllers so as to minimize disrupt sleep patterns accumulation of sleep debt and cognitive performance lastly it recommended for the benefit of controllers themselves they have a responsibility to take train controllers and what is the plan i can answer at least part of your question sir and if you'd like i can take the rest for the record or if i may be able to respond here we consider  simulator training to be a very effective tool and we would encourage f a a to move out on that as quickly as it's able our estimates are that simulators cost about five hundred thousand dollars per facility plus approximately another one tower simulator the benefits are that they can allow evaluation of new operations they can study alternatives for improving safety and they are a great benefit for both new and controllers and they've been proven in a couple of instances at boston logan airport tower simulator was used to aid in establishing safety procedures to be implemented with the new newly constructed runway the tower simulator at los angeles airport to study did not find a causal link we relied in large measure on the n t s b finding that basically said it was possible that it was a contributing factor but no we did not find the causal link and the gentleman the other gentleman from north carolina mister you mr chairman i know people and going north carolina is getting an unfair advantage here i'll have to admit what is the maximum allowable overtime for an air traffic controller how many hours ten hours ten hours a day how many hours a week it would be fifty hours one day of overtime i believe of overtime are being voluntarily worked by controllers about eighty percent of the current overtime which is about two percent system wide is voluntary controllers sign up to do it i have some facilities with virtually no overtime some as high as nine percent in some areas and nine percent is too high and we're working to get some staffing in those facilities in an airline it's important the fatigue that we can make further progress to address this issue so we we look forward to working this issue later this year and hope to have some very positive results and use that conference as a springboard to move forward to address fatigue issues town because i want to hear what i think is the pilot as much as i want to hear the professionals speak to us from their perspective about what a pilot does can and should  be the number one runway incursion preventer in the whole process because very few examples generate one example where there was no visibility and you could not see and be seen but for the large thank you very much mr chairman because i didn't get here in time to hear the testimony of the witnesses i didn't think i was going to ask any questions but i've got a couple of things that i am curious about and one is we've all been  given a chart showing that and it says it's from the f a a from the air traffic control organization that runway incursions are less than half of what they were in two thousand and per million operations this is a twelve percent increase over two thousand and six and the highest number since two thousand and one i'm a little confused as to which it is are the cut in half is this chart shows that in other behavior are was that did the f a a have something to do with that in scheduling they had done i mean you know if the f a a is responsible for that then that's something that  better hope we have eliminated that shouldn't have been any place but if it's if it's something that is just a matter that on his own private time he stayed up in there then there's not much we can do about that i'm just curious as to which it was or what would have caused him to only sleep only two hours out of the last twenty four before that happened that accident happened congressman docking it was a combination of both things that you mentioned  scheduling factors he had worked a shift and had gotten off duty earlier in the day one thirty or two o'clock in the afternoon and he was all for his i guess eight hours but then he did personal things during during that time off including going out and running and apparently only slept about two hours and then showed up to work again to work the shift which the action occurred which which i think actually started around eleven o'clock at night so so  this an aberration or how common is it that controllers get off and then only have eight hours between when they're doing work again let me answers in a couple ways if you're really going to but as we were going to we're just starting to do that at the united airlines before i retired there's new science that we have now that really knows how to look at the same ways that ten years ago  we didn't have so and it's applicable to controllers and pilots and everybody if you're really going to study fatigue it's everything it's scheduling practices it's what people do with their time off it's how patterns of schedules are put together and that's what this conference that mr bayle og will be sponsoring later this spring is going to address is to really take a scientific look at this the other is issue about fatigue that is a bit concerning is there's a lot of anecdotal stories about it but the data is important let me ask you this with the staff is telling me there's telling is that this comes from a two to one air traffic control scheduling practice that the controllers themselves have asked for want or is popular with them is that right is this happening because this is what the controllers want or we understand it's a popular scheduling practice yes but i think again if we can get into the spring will understand and you know popular scheduling practices are you know i've been if you know how to rest and you know how to use your time off during those periods it may or may not be a risk at all so that's what we have to get into the other part of this is as i mentioned earlier the aviation safety action program that we want to start with the controllers is the sleeping there at the facility because another time somebody leaves and drives home and does all the things people ordinarily do you could run into some problems there but thank you very much mr chairman i think the gentleman there and to clarify a point just so we understand i mean i know mr koski you're saying that if the person knows how to rest but if you are working sixteen out of twenty four hours during that eight hour period that you're off i'm sure there are other personal things family things that you have to attend to but you just don't go home and get eight hours sleep so regardless if it's the agency forcing the controller to work sixteen hours in a twenty four hour period or if it's on the part of the controller wanting to work that schedule it seems to me that it's an issue that needs to be addressed in the other point that i make to mr duncan's question about increased or decreased between two thousand and one and two thousand and six regardless of how you look at the numbers we do know for a fact that in the first quarter of fiscal year two thousand and eight we have had ten runway incursions missouri mr graves the gentleman from north carolina mr hayes would like to be recognized for a comment thank you mr chairman we've talked about the situation elect and i think it's important to understand there is an issue about the controller but we haven't talked about what happened with the air point caskey refer back to the time when you were flying the line so that members of the panel and the happened when they pushed back what did they say to each other where did this go wrong so i would say that based on what i know of and i think mr some wild actually would be able to give you the detail on this small defer to him but it i think the correct runway and to make the right decision obviously that came apart a crew has to work together the captains in command of the aircraft the captain sets the atmosphere in the cockpit for running your checklist doing your briefings efficiently and making sure you're going in the right direction you have the taxi at least at my company you have the taxi chart in front of you brief these routes you validated that the heading of the aircraft was on the assigned runway before you actually took off  so that that's how you do it right you have really good cockpit procedures reinforced by training and reinforced by good training and checking standards but that obviously broke down  r congressman because i'm just a neophyte compared to captain kirk koski he had thirty three years with the airline i only had twenty four most of which were based in charlotte douglas international airport so the to determine the probable cause of the comair accident was to be the failure of the flight crew to use available cues and age to identify the airplane's location on the airport surface during taxi and their failure to cross check and verify that the airplane was on the on the correct runway contributing to the accident was in fact distractions that the crew unable themselves to get into due to violations of the sterile cockpit and we also did did take an opportunity to point out that if the f a a had required that all runway crossings be authorized by specific air traffic control clearances we listed that as a contributing factor as well but you must just important to know forward in just a few minutes i will do the introductions right now we are expecting in about fifteen minutes a vote on the floor of the house i don't know how many but we will try and get our second panel at the witness table i'll do introductions now as we are making the transition and the first witness and i will captain john frater the president of the airline pilots association mr patrick for the president of the national air traffic controllers association mr mr prager your time's up no i'm just kidding m opportunity to provide the pilot's perspective on runway safety as you know our pilots operating complex environments every day they fly in all types of adverse weather and with limited visibility conditions they complete the demanding task of a safe landing over and over often after being on duty for more than sixteen hours and being awake for more than twenty hours all of these tasks demand vigilance and high situational awareness these are the challenges we face every day in delivering our passengers safely to their gate but the risk for a runway incursion in this environment is constantly increasing it's an issue that must become a national aviation safety priority and help us thank the chairman for putting it on to the subcommittee's agenda according to the f a a statistics during the last three months of last year there was an average of two point five runway incursions every day in the united states providing the potential for a catastrophe the f a a categorizes this wrist as unacceptable we agree but i'm taking it a step further this rate of occurrence is inexcusable  categorizes runway incursions as these are a pilot deviation are an operational air but those classifications don't tell the whole story while it may be convenient to assign blame to either the pilot or the controller it doesn't address the root of the problem we must understand why these runway incursions take place and then put mitigations into the system so that we can help pilots and controllers avoid these there's dozens of experts in several countries have studied the runway incursion risk over the years and devise mitigations that can greatly lessen the risk in ground operations today in fact according to the commercial aviation safety team the problem can be reduced by as much as ninety five percent with the implementation of new technologies new training and operational techniques increase both pilots and controllers situational awareness technological solutions include cockpit moving map displays similar to the g p s device that many people have in their cars today the integration of a d s be to enable pilots and controllers to track all aircraft in vehicles on the surface and up to one thousand feet above ground level automatic runway occupancy alerting and digital data link clearances that are then displayed on the cockpit moving map most airline pilots however are still flying aging airliners with none of this technology available to them other album and alpha recommended improvements include the installation of red runway status and hold lights the simple and inexpensive lights automatically provide a direct indication of runway status and warn pilots of landing and departing aircraft without his help the mit lincoln laboratory tested this system at the dallas fort worth international airport and since its implementation in two thousand and five runway incursions there have decreased by seventy percent not all runway safety solutions involve high tech gadgets some low tech solutions and involve something as simple and cheap as a can of paint which can be used to improve our runway and taxiway markings the f a a issued an advisory circular in two thousand and five requiring that the seventy five busiest airports and hands there taxiway centerline markings near runway intersections by june of this year all but four of these airports have completed that requirement but our pilots and our passengers fly to hundreds of airports and help us strongly recommend that these airports surface markings become standard for all part one thirty nine airports that's a total of five hundred sixty six airports sixty two of these airports have voluntarily made improvements at least some spurred by fatal accidents that still leaves roughly two thirds of america's airports that need better ground markings for pilots some airports have found that installing perimeter taxiways also reduces runway incursion risk atlanta hartsfield is a good example of that they've eliminated six hundred runway crossings a day and reduced delays by sixty percent our union is doing its part for runway safety help is reaching out to our sixty thousand pilots in both the united states and canada through a new communications initiative that we call hold short for runway safety it is designed to pilots on what we can do now to prevent runway incursions our initiative includes a web site educational material a series of newsletters going out starting this friday and we'll keep sending them out to try to keep the focus on runway safety in coordination with the f a a alpha and united airlines produced a video for a training  video to highlight the problems and how we can reduce operational errors but in order to adequately prepare for the increase in airport operations and the increased runway incursion risk album urges the government to commit proper funding to improve our national airspace system every stakeholder and every passenger deserves it they deserve it now thank you sir thank you captain prater in the reauthorization bill and package in a timely fashion moving it through the house last september and a bipartisan support of two hundred sixty seven members of this committee house i further applaud your efforts earlier this week in passing a short term extension rather than putting this import legislated off the ledge next year it is nachas hope that the senate will yield to the house and forgo efforts to move an extension that goes beyond june thirtieth are fears that doing so would undermine the hard work this committee as well as the senate finance and commerce committee and failed to address the immediate future needs of the national airspace system aviation is vital to this nation's economy and h r twenty eight eighty one maintains important provisions that keep our system the safest and most efficient in the world back urges the senate to take f a a reauthorization out of a holding pattern and actually on passing a comprehensive long term bill turning to the topic of today's hearings nachas mission is to preserve promote and improve the safety of air travel within the united states and to serve as an advocate for traffic controllers and other aviation safety professionals air traffic controllers and pilots more than anyone else here today are responsible for the safety of the runways at america's airports macca has been trying to direct attention to decreasing safety margins in our skies and on our runways for years we are no longer alone in the past few months a host of independent federal watchdogs have joined the chorus of rising raising rising concerns about aviation safety in the of ember the g a o issued a report that warned of a high risk of a catastrophic runaway collision occurring in the u s december the transportation department inspector general launched an investigation on the role that workplace conditions played in several close calls at the f a a facilities in illinois and the n t s b recently had a runway incursions in incidents caused by air traffic controller fatigue to their two thousand and eight list of most wanted aviation safety improvements in addition last april n t s b chairman rosenker call them both back in the f a a to work together to go back controller fatigue nachas response was to welcome that recommendation and to work with the agency and offer our assistance to help the proving our own safety today to the aviation committee first because each airport represents unique challenges which negate the usefulness of broad universal solutions not to recommend the creation of a runway incursion prevention committee for each airport these groups would be comprised of the local stakeholders including pilots air traffic controllers airport management vehicle driver operators and the f a a second macca recommends a controller staffing at our nation's f a a facilities be adequately addressed today there are fifteen hundred fewer fewer fully certified controllers and they were on nine eleven leaving fewer eyes to watch more planes and the result is increased controller fatigue if the f o to return to the bargaining table or the parties left off a negotiating good faith with macca the effort would make staying in the f more attracted to both newly hired controllers and those eligible for retirement unfortunately the current rate of controller attrition is six point two a day and the system can't sustain that rate much longer third macas recommendation that the f a work in collaboration with the union in the development of deployment of new technology under the liaison program the f a and that the work side by side and creation of new technologies as v x and effective surface surveillance system is a product of that collaboration that the recommends of the deployment of this technology at all  route to a second runway or gate macca recommends that end around taxiways be constructed and utilized in all airports where such construction is possible mr chairman that is not alone and sounded the alarm on passenger safety the n t s b the g a o have determined the threat of controller america thank you for the opportunity to join you today and discuss runway safety issues airlines have been focused on reducing runway incursions since well before it was in vogue and appreciate the subcommittee's interest in this matter runway incursions are a serious threat to civil aviation safety both to airlines and to general aviation but we are making progress and i'd like to concentrate my remarks today on three areas first on the data as it pertains to serious commercial incursions you heard the definitions earlier second on our strategy for achieving these improvements and third actions that are underway to reduce the risk of incursions before proceeding further though i'd like to mention that we have only yesterday reemphasized our commitment to improve safety in the airport operating environment on tuesday eighty eight member airlines f a a and other interested members of the aviation community held the runway safety awareness day roughly seventy thousand pilots represented by fifty airlines received a letter from senior management reinforcing the industry's collective commitment to improving runway safety as a starting point in this discussion what do the f a a data tell us cording to the f a a the frequency of serious runway incursions a or b have decreased steadily since two thousand and one with commercial operations accounting for approximately a third of the total the chart on page two of my written statement depicts this data but narrowing the focus further the number of serious incursions involving commercial operations that were attributable to pilot deviation has also declined how did we achieve these improvements in this as with so many other safety based endeavors the aviation community looks to da to identify what aspects of a problem need to concentrate on we can call upon multiple sources of safety related information like a step and focus in cast and assayas to better understand the nature and the extent of the risks that confront us our analytical abilities have advanced to the point where we can assess future vulnerabilities and therefore don't have to rely exclusively on what's happened in the past this means that in the context of airport surface operations we can not only spot overall trends but can can pinpoint specific locations that are prone to incursions the decline in serious runway incursions as a result of well thought out collaboration among stakeholders recognizing this achievement of course does not mean that we should be satisfied with it we most emphatically are not but it does give us the confidence to work toward greater improvements that is the task before us what actions are underway to reduce the risk of incursions because of the data evaluation efforts we understand far better the airport surface operating environment than we ever have the more informed perspective has resulted in an array of initiatives designed to decrease runway incursion risks including elevating the awareness of risk reducing flight crew distractions during the taxi phase of flight emphasizing the use of standardized a t c verbiage and clearances and hansen pilot training leveraging the work of the existing runway safety action teams in hansing signage lighting in markings reconfiguring taxi ways to eliminate confusing intersections in runway crossings and in addition to these initiatives several emerging technologies will improve the operating environment things like as the cockpit moving map and head up displays automated lighting systems and finally we all look to  greater airport surface safety improvements each of the foregoing is an important issue that will contribute to improving safety however we believe that three items are worthy of special attention to short term high priority initiatives and they are continuing to eliminate cockpit distractions for crews during the taxi out in taxi in phase continuing to eliminate confusing taxiway and runway intersection adding signage and lighting and introducing technologies that link as t kazim put the warning directly into the flight deck and finally tapping into critical safety information by implementing a step program for air traffic controllers similar to those use so effectively within the airline community these three initiatives can be accomplished in the short run and promise to improve the safety of the airport and operating environment they should be regarded as supplanting the other initiatives that i have mentioned but are worthy of further immediate emphasis the subcommittee's interest in the issue of runway incursions is always welcome and always timely the threat is real the need for continued action is indisputable and the aviation community remains ready and committed to reducing the risk of runway incursions thank you thank you  we have four to five votes on the floor right now which means that the committee will stand in recess until our we would ask you to be back by four twenty twenty minutes after four so if you want to get a cup of coffee or we'll be back here approximately four twenty we'd ask you to be here and we'd ask our witnesses to state to those of you have already given your testimony so that members have the ability to ask questions of the subcommittee will stand in recess i'm the president of airports council international north america are three hundred sixty member airports and plane more than ninety five percent of the domestic and virtually all of the international passenger and cargo traffic in north america and nearly four hundred a related businesses are also members of a we applaud the committee for its tireless work in h r twenty eight eighty one the resources the bill provides will fund many critical projects that bring important safety benefits we thank you for your leadership and commitment to both airports and the aviation industry and we commend both you and the house of representatives for passing this bill and that's why two thousand and seven the f a a reported twenty four serious runway incursions out of more than sixty one million operations although the nation's airport runways remain safe reducing the risk of runway incursions as a top priority and airports have taken a particularly aggressive stance in addressing the safety concerns last august more than forty leaders including a north american participated in the call to action the purpose of the call to action was to reach a consensus on a number of short medium and long term initiatives that could be undertaken to further improve the safety of operations  america's airports by june thirtieth two thousand requiring seventy five large and medium airports to paint red markings on the taxiway hold line to identify the approach of a specifically marked  runway also requiring these airports to improve centerline painting and markings on all airport taxi ways to give differential color distinctions to enter taxi ways are easily seen by taxing pilots at night or under poor weather conditions to date actually the number is seventy two out of seventy five another one has complied airports have completed the three airports will will be finished by the head of the deadline now the f a a is not requiring new painting in markings for smaller airports  depart one thirty nine however the called action calls plan calls on those smaller airports to voluntarily do so and i'm pleased to say that by the end of this year two hundred fifty one will have done so mid term runway safety action specific to airports included include the accelerated installation or runway status lights which use runway and taxiway centerline illuminated lights to warn pilots of potential runway conflicts and prompt them to notify the t seventy percent after runway status lights were installed due to the success in early december d f w began construction of runway status lights on two additional runways and additional mid term action includes final approach runway occupancy status lights arrows as a test test concept the flashes the existing lights to give direct notifications of the pilots of the runway is occupied and on safer landing test airports include dallas and long beach longer term actions include full deployment of as the two thousand and ten moving map displays and cockpits d s p in and out as well as cockpit display of traffic information things you've heard about already today independent of the requirements and technological evaluations airports are taking independent action to enhance runway safety last year atlanta completed its end around perimeter essentially eliminating six hundred fifty daily runway crossings six hundred fifty minneapolis grand rapids and pittsburgh have constructed tunnels under their respective runways to eliminate the need for vehicles to cross runways on the surface airports also continue to provide recurrent training for all airport employees who operate vehicles on the movement area of the airfield in addition to airport specific actions we recently joined the commercial aviation safety team or discussed earlier a cooperative voluntary partnership consisting of all commercial aviation stakeholders with a mission to increase safety using an integrated data driven approach based on analyzing accident causes identifying ways to make positive changes and implementing improvements to help address runway safety and incursion issues and before wrapping up let me also say we've heard a lot about various systems that i've just mentioned and earlier people have mentioned it's important that down the road we look for consistent applications and uniform uniform deployment of those systems pilots work in a lot of different airports they don't just work at one airport they go from airport to airport it's particularly important when they come to an airport what they see is consistent from airport to airport eventually especially a lot of focus on the larger airports but a lot of regional pilots will fly back and forth between a larger than a smaller non hub six seven eight times a day and have that consistency consistency is important so i conclude by faxing you for holding this infrastructure subcommittee on aviation thank you for inviting me to participate in this hearing on runway safety the airport safety and security coordinator at beverly municipal airport a ga airport and a reliever airport located approximately twenty two miles north of boston i'm testifying today on behalf of beverly airport and the american association of airport executives mr chairman before i proceed i'd like to thank you and the other members of this committee for your leadership on h r twenty eight eighty one the f a a reauthorization act of two thousand and seven airports a particularly grateful that the bill would raise the p f c cap to seven dollars an increase a ip funding by a hundred million dollars a year funding provisions will help airports improve safety prevent runway incursions and accommodating creasing demand since the senate has yet to complete its action on a multi year f a a reauthorization bill i would also like to thank you for helping to pass the shot term extension bill yesterday as members of this subcommittee well no contract authority has already expired and the aviation excise taxes are slated to expire at the end of this month i hope the senate will follow your lead in approved fifty to seventy so airports can begin to receive the funds that they need for critical safety projects today we're here to focus on runway safety as passenger numbers continue to rise and takeoffs and landings increase it's imperative that we redouble our efforts to improve runway safety i'd like to describe just a few of the steps that airports are now taking to improve runway safety and some of the technology that could help prevent further runway incursions airports around the country using the enhanced tax to a center line markings and surface hold position signs to prevent runway incursions commercial airports with more than one point five million in plane which per year are required to have these markings installed by june thirtieth standardisation as you've already heard has long been a crucial tenet at all commercial airports and i commend the f a a for recently issuing a draft advisory circular that would extend these enhanced surface markings to all piled one thirty nine airports airports are also beginning to add perimeter taxi ways to reduce runway crossings and the potential for runway incursions the atlanta airport installed and around taxiway earlier this year and according to the f a a the new taxiways expected to eliminate nearly seven hundred runway crossings per day d f w is also engage in a perimeter taxiway project that will include perimeter taxiways in all four quadrants of the airport the first ones expected in the southeast quadrant to be completed by the end of this year when all for a completed this will eliminate as many as seventeen hundred runway crossings per day at w taxiway projects will help to prevent runway incursions at two of the busiest airports in the united states the f a a points out that training is one of the keys to reducing the severity and frequency of runway incursions i agree and i'm very proud of the computer based interactive employee training system that aaa has developed to better training airport and airline employees and other airport tenets aaa is delivered nearly one million training sessions at fifty five airports around the country training programs are highly effective in training because employees receive a video video component that features the actual work environment at their airport some of the topics include movement and non movement driver training area as well as a field safety and incursion prevention one of the most promising technology improvements to prevent runway incursions is the runway status lights system the system uses radar to anticipate the use of a runway by an arriving or departing aircraft and then controls a series of lights to provide information to pilots and vehicle drivers regarding the runway status the f a a has been testing this at d f w and san diego runway incursions as you've heard in the test case has decreased by seventy percent on the test runway at d f w i hope that f a a will continue to work with airports and other aviation stakeholders in an effort to expedite the deployment of this system we should also use new technology to improve runway safety at smaller airports to have that goal the f a a is testing to low cost ground surveillance systems at spokane airport they could improve runway safety at small to medium sized airports one uses millimeter wave sensors the other uses xpand radar to detect motion on the airports runways and taxiways i'm encouraged by reports that these systems are effective relatively inexpensive and easy to install i hope the additional evaluations will yield positive results and that the f a a will be able to expedite the deployment of this system as well mr chairman and members of the aviation subcommittee thank you again for inviting me to attend today's hearing on runway safety and i look forward to answering any of your questions we thank you in the chair now recognizes mr boyer rendered a five minute rule well thank you mr chairman and thank you for the witness rest period i must admit that i did not sleep or use it for personal time but the lowing incoherent that's probably the reason i'm here today unlike usually to represent not only of which i'm the president but the safety foundation and i can think of no single organization outside of government and perhaps even in government when i'm through here that has spent more time energy and materials and dollars on runway safety  first of all we haven't talked at all about ga statistics i'm not going to spend a lot of time it's in our testimony i just want to put up one graph with all due respect to the end of the table this isn't a competition but just to put in perspective i've been hearing a lot about air carrier airports and airline pilots they're about seventy nine thousand airline pilots two hundred seventy three pilot deviations during the three year period covered by the f a a numbers there are almost a half a million pilots and yes there are more deviations about five hundred eighty but if you look at the ratio of ga pilots it is a group that has a lower propensity to this kind of accident in many times do particularly to the types of airports they use  one runway incursion whether it be by an airline or airplane or a combination or ground vehicle i gotta say eight hundred independence avenue we put in that everyone at the table airports ground operators airline pilots airlines themselves we do have a problem because the statistics should be at zero if they could be and that's what we all strive to do and i want to concentrate on just one area and that's a leadership that came out of the i g it came out of the g a o testimony you heard and i'm going to go off the slide just a little bit and talk about nine hundred ninety seven when then f a a administrator jane garvey called me when she realized this is one of the five top issues she had to deal with during her administration and said quote phil can you do something can work so much faster than the f and we stepped in at that time and we did a lot of things and i provided a packet for the committee of all those things we've done i've got to tell you the administrator at that time the late ninety's she formed a task force i was on at the head of alba was on it others were on it she met with us personally almost every single month we looked at the metrics together she said what are you doing out of water here the b s i want to know what you're actually doing and the f a a embarked on what i would say in my eighteen years was the biggest effort on safety that i have seen them undertake the program was well funded other divisions of f a a and they'll tell you this today we're jealous of the kind of money this project was given regional meetings were held around the country with airports that my two friends are to the right represent with the airline pilots the one to those airports i remember los angeles which had a language problem and with the ga community  but it all boils down to just what you and chairman over star said in your rebuttal to the usa editorial today it's not about aviation interests having a lack of money you were talking about and the words were does a lot with aviation and runway safety when you're not being prodded when you're not being asked for more like we were for those five years it went off the table so what have we done well we've educated our pilot members on bills a good bill for the f a a financing senate bills got a few problems we've been spending our time and things like that well you refocused them with the g a o study the f a a got your attention again but frankly let's call  the leadership on this issue and believe me industry is ready to go we've been ready to do all kinds of things i want you to look at you look at the solution look at the low tech thing you're going to you've heard a lot of high tech here we're ready to help we're ready to take all the things we've done like our magazine where we found in four hundred runway safety brochure in the past and we certainly are getting a message now from  and runways become more crowded one that absolutely requires new solutions we can build on existing technology implement these solutions both in the short and long term this will require active and vigorous support from the  aircraft operators airports and manufacturers and perhaps most critical will be your continued oversight and vigilance to hold everyone's feet to the fire on a timely fashion mr chairman i come before you representing terrain since the introduction of our enhanced ground proximity warning system or see fit accidents have dropped over five hundred percent and most importantly not one aircraft operating with our couple of solutions available now pilots and tracking their position on the airport surface one solution is honeywell's runway awareness and advisory system or provides verbal announcements over the cockpit audio system indicating the aircraft is ition relative to the runways allowing pilots to remain heads up and visually alert surroundings is a software upgrade to the computers that are complimentary with rats providing verbal cues and the moving map backing them up with a picture of their position short term solutions pilot avoid placing their airplane in runway incursion situations the longer term objective is to provide pilots with better information about what other aircraft are doing and warn controllers simultaneously when a collision is imminent we call this breaking the chain of events that could ultimately lead to an accident today surface systems generated only for air traffic controllers with the aircraft traveling at high rates of speed seconds needed for the verbal relay between control and pilot can be the difference between a catastrophic collision solution in our prototype system as you saw in the testimony from dr dillingham from g a o alerts are provided directly and automatically to pilots maximizing the time available to resolve the incursion before an accident this technology was successfully demonstrated to senior f a a and n t s b officials in the summer of two thousand and seven syracuse new york another longer term solution involves the deployment of automatic dependence on broadcast radio is more aircraft are modified to broadcast and receive this information the ability to identify potential conflicts conflicts becomes viable while the f a a is currently proposed rule doesn't require broadcast their radio information until twenty twenty f a s traffic information service can accelerate the practical use of aircraft incursion detection and alerting mr chairman i've described a series of short and long term solutions for improving runway safety the key question is when celebrating the deployment requires a cooperative effort among a number of stakeholders and honeywell recommends this committee aggressively pursue the following three actions one strongly encourage the adoption of better pilot situational awareness capabilities including the preparation of certification criteria and financial incentives for equipping to accelerate the implementation traffic information service at airports throughout the national airspace require regulatory and procedural changes that will allow us to broadcast alerting signals  cockpit mr chairman members of the subcommittee thank you again for the opportunity to present our recommendations to address aviation safety thank you for your testimony and questions and i'll turn it over to  car crossings the runway crossings the potential caution areas so that they're more easily recognize from inside the cockpit instead of depending on the exterior clues  you have a plan that runway and safety plan that has not been updated since two thousand and two we know that it's not a priority for the agency but i hope that mr koski his testimony here today he is committed to his  over thirty years experience in the cockpit we hope that that will change but let me ask you you mention what you have done with your membership with the foundation in developing educational materials for general aviation pilots how closely have you and the foundation work with the with the f a a concerning running the runway office and development in order to get this information out to the pilots as a strictly aopa doing this or are you coordinating this with the f a a it's a very good question and i guess the first five years it was in total cooperation the brochures we submitted i think the committee had the f a a safety foundation logos on and then it is been pretty much unilateral actually after the lexington accident that you already talked about today which was an air carrier problem but you know could happen any general aviation pilot actually did happen last in st augustine they only had a three hundred foot runway so the in the the situation was even exacerbated which was left but we put out two hundred cd two hundred thousand c d s of our course on runway safety after that accident at our expense and mail them to members to call attention to runway safety i think now boy this week a lot's gone on we've been getting calls yet still there are people in the runway safety office today that yesterday called our offices and we didn't know you folks did a cd with the airlines on runway safety and it was funded by the very office that was calling so no coordination it's a consistent pattern here that concerns me and i'm not here to beat up on the f a a i'm just here to look at the facts and try and make certain that the system gets better you know we have found a lack of communication coordination and reaching out to the users of the system and that takes me to the i don't know if they recognized it but there is a fatigue issue and that they were you know working with a concern controller fatigue and i just wonder what action has the f a a taken to reach out to to your controllers to address the issue of mr chairman the n t s b made two recommendations to the f a a and to us to look at the fatigue issue and controller scheduling and things of that nature we wrote a letter to the administrator at the time and said would be more than happy to do that that was probably two thousand and seven in may of two thousand and seven sometime that timeframe we did not hear back from the administrator till september where she said she would like to do that at some point in time and they would let us know what kind of requirements or subject matter experts they would like for us to participate in the meantime they had sent a letter to the chairman of the n t s b stating that we are working together sometime in august the agency has created their own work group they're already doing investigations and i would imagine scheduling our controllers scheduling they have not included us at all in most of those subjects or those discussions and  bellingham the inspector general the and encouraging the f a a to work with user groups to get their input in and obviously they have dropped the ball and regarding what you were doing at a local with your foundation that they are not working as closely as they have in the past and obviously if they say that they're working with napco to try and address these issues and they have not it's an issue and it it brings up not only the runway incursion in safety issues but reauthorization bill than the administration calls for in its own proposal my concern is you know not what we're getting in the end but how we get there so that we don't spend a lot of money and go back and say oh we've got to retrofit this now question the facility manager calls in overtime because they require overtime to work the shift it's not because a controller wakes up in the morning and says you know what i feel like working overtime today i'll tell the manager i'll be in the work that's not how it works that's just a way of controllers deciding how they're going to work overtime if they volunteer for the call them first if they don't sign it there are many facilities in this country where they are signing that overtime southern california tracon atlanta tower and miami center just to name a few those people are forced to work and what that does is because they're working short shifts controllers are working positions combined positions that would normally take two or three people to work that means they're working more traffic they're working more frequency they're working more airplanes they have to be greater situational awareness that kind of especially if you're working six days a week or you're working ten hours in a day that's the impact of working overtime in the to get it creates now they just like to plump in these numbers it's only two percent of the entire country they like to generalize in that respect but the fact of the matter is that as most of our busiest airports and some of our busiest facilities in this country there's a lot of overtime being worked in there's a lot of a lot of tired controllers and that's the opportunity to make mistakes and as captain prater stated  know you have an experienced pilots now and infiltrating the system and they're working sixteen to twenty hour days even though they're not flying it they're still busy doing something for the time someone's going to make a mistake and we rely on each other pilots and controllers to catch each other when we make mistakes the experience levels of the people working out like the agency is doing right now that's a recipe for disaster captain prater would you like to comment on pilot fatigue very briefly even though i would like to talk for about sixteen hours which is what the has a standard for an airline pilot i'll try to keep it a little shorter than that but the fact is we can do sixteen hours followed by eight hours away from the airplane go through the airport find a hotel get a couple hours rest and come back eight hours later go through security all of you travel well so you know it's going to be twenty thirty minutes walk to the airport then start another sixteen hour day at the end of several of those you're making the most important decision of your life every day you're landing an airplane passengers pull a cargo in the weather and if it is up with you what we have seen  more since two thousand and one is that we're seeing many pilots flying longer days being pushed to those max some of its economics some of it's shortage of pilots some of it is because there's not enough pilots staffed to fly that full we're seeing the cumulative effect and i can say easily in my thirty five thirty six years flying i've made a few mistakes other people have caught the first officer a controller we do depend upon each other but we also depend upon trying to be as real as possible congressman hayes i think talked about it earlier well rested well experienced well trained pilot is how we prevent incidents from happening thank the i think nine working groups they have a safety working group and i'm just curious to know if any of the organizations that you're involved with are involved in that or if you could discuss that if you are being consulted if there are problems with that or   is that industry or the people that make up the subgroups so they have to take people from their companies to try and work and volunteer while they pay them to do that to work on certain projects i can't pull people out of the f a a facilities to go do that so i'm kind of limited in what we can do based on what staff i have available nationally but it's a good concept that we don't get that much participation other than the main group from the airport side we've been very involved from the beginning phil's actually the co chair of the i am season maybe i should let him  talk in greater detail but from the airport side we've been very involved you know like pat said you have to go out and get some some folks from the airports and so forth to participate in some of the groups and i have to say i got up to a slow start but in recent and my other co chair is strange bedfellow the head of the airlines association but we do take this pretty seriously gregg is right we were off to a slow start i think it's still fairly slow i mean for you and congress to be able to articulate what it's going to cost what it's going to be what's going to do in capacity you could hold hearings after hearings right now you wouldn't get there the thing that i've sort of adopted and actually the airlines have jumped on this so once again we're together on this is we need a little and that's what we were talking about here not next gen not twenty twenty five or twenty twenty for a d s p or some of the other things we need to take some practical solutions as are happening now with runway safety because of your interest in the subject need to also look at what we can do for your constituents in your district the travel on the airlines fralin general aviation that we can do now at a low cost no cost and there are plenty of things and i think that's where the industry and that are and so on that there could be problems in communication or safety and runway collisions that are that occur because of people being less familiar with how to how people interact and all that is there any variation in international flights to the united states or is it is safe as is that really not a factor is that then so is it so clearances would be required to cross a runway so we would never be given clearance to cross attacks across one or two runways and take off on another runway might have prevented lexington because the crew would have been cleared to the copilot wait a minute let's just stop until we find out what the instructions are and sometimes the controller there will slow down and make sure that we're able to understand the directions so i think the key to it is is taking the time standard phrase ology the standards and i think we would see an increased runway safety environment back here in the states if we did  it you had asked about airports and were part of a global organization airports council international and they did a global survey of this kind of thing i think we provided the information to the staff but it showed that this region has the best ra their ground handling other parts of the world here the airlines do the ground handling other parts of the world airports typically do it and so there are different if you look at a print safety and so forth you might find some some things  overseas that don't stack up quite as well either i think we do a pretty good job here but we did provide the international information to the staff we'd be happy to elaborate on if you'd like to thank you  and of course our fellow union and brothers and sisters in the pilots association and we've started meeting and major hubs now we just started this year with our safety committee and their safety committees and we're trying to explain the airspace to these guys and gals  always been in the cockpit by doing this what we've been able to do is give the pilot better situational awareness inside the cockpit of the methodology is that basically  problems so you don't want to give them too much information you want to just give them the exact relevant information they need at the time and so then we develop a prototype that prototype something that we can test with similar same groups tak flying take it into kind of a pre production phase and then ultimately working with the f a a and the certification authorities globally come up with a certified system and in general that in general that process can take anywhere from three to five years package what are the end and all the great table in the f a a going to do to bring the advantages at a reasonable price to the flying public be it airlines or general aviation i mean that's just sitting there waiting to happen if we get anybody i think first of all i want to go on the record in answering the question you asked earlier with the predator and pat was very instrumental actually i think he attended and worked with a couple of them some in our series our air safety foundation did around the country and still is doing called a t c and you and it was done in conjunction with pat had some of his controllers evening this was put on around the country and this was probably the biggest audience drawing set of seminars we have ever done because of the interest of the pilots in the hearing and being able to talk directly with the membership but in answer to your question i think we have to get into what needs to be certified by the agency and what is supplemental to flying the airplane we sit today and most of our ga planes if they have that are new with the plot of the runway environment and the taxi ways and the airplane on them so that we can taxi a busy airport freighter would be jealous of this today but it's the certification level it is in a part ninety one operation supplemental so what needs to go through years and years of study to say isn't the g p s in the car good enough to know we're coming up on this street we're coming up on this taxiway or this runway so a lot of the slowdown is trying to channel  a a into saying everything that's in the cockpit that's for the safety of flight the basic safety of flight yes needs to be certified but supplemental information like datalink radar like like the moving map displays don't really need to go through that same level of certification if you still have a paper chart you still have a copilot you're still looking out the window this is just that extra information like it is on your car g basic flight training you got to look out the window that's the bottom line you gotta look out the window and all the technology in the world isn't going to replace you know that simple thing when we took advanced flight training when i take an advance flight training you learn to bury your head  but you know that goes for the controllers too and that's the reason the tower so tall so you can look out the window and see what's going on i know i'm oversimplifying this to a great deal but the fact of the matter remains that simple technology enhanced runway markings work stop signs or the we anticipated because of votes on the floor but we appreciate all of our witnesses staying here to answer questions from members of the panel i can assure not only our friends at the f a a but all of you and everyone in the industry that we are going to continue to provide aggressive oversight to make certain that the f a a is moving forward doing everything they possibly can do working with all of the stakeholders so that we can improve the runway