Runway safety is an enormously complex issue.
It involves the human performance of thousands of air traffic controllers, more than 600,000 pilots, and what could be a million or more people authorized to operate vehicles on our nation's airports. Yes, it is a complex issue. It is also an urgent issue. Our forecasters project a 35 percent increase in commercial airline flights and a 21 percent increase in general aviation operations in the next ten years. This significant growth at virtually the same airport capacity that we use today only makes our job to improve runway safety even more important and more pressing.