WASHINGTON, DC, January 23, 2007 – Today, in a speech given before the Aero Club of Washington, Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters stressed how vital aviation is to our economy and how all Americans benefit from a healthy air transportation system. Secretary Peters pointed out that aviation contributes over $640 billion a year to the national economy and is responsible for creating over nine million jobs.

GAMA agrees that protecting this national resource is crucial, however, we could not disagree more with the link that Secretary Peters attempts to make between the Administration’s desire for user fees and the ability to modernize the national airspace system. Secretary Peters seems to assert that the current funding mechanism, which is bringing in record Trust Fund revenues, is somehow broken and that transformation of the air transportation system cannot occur without a new funding mechanism.

One point that all sectors in aviation agree upon is that our air traffic control system is in need of transformation. However, GAMA will continue to press the Administration for a coherent modernization plan that improves capacity, delineates projected costs, estimates anticipated savings, and recognizes significant equipage costs to users, before any decisions can be made on financing the transformation of the national airspace system.