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Trump’s Budget Bill Sets Aside $12.5B to Modernize the Air Traffic Control System. Aviation Workers Say More is Needed
The country’s air traffic control system needs an update.
Major crashes in Newark and Washington, D.C., this year have placed a national spotlight on the system’s shortcomings. The Federal Aviation Administration, the agency that regulates civil aviation, is more than 3,000 certified air traffic controllers short, using outdated technology and is generally under-resourced.
President Donald Trump’s so-called “big beautiful bill” pledges to fill those gaps, setting aside $12.5 billion to modernize the system.
Revitalizing the FAA and aerospace industry has been a policy priority for the Trump administration. Back in May, U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy announced a plan “to build a brand new, state-of-the-art air traffic control system that will be the envy of the world.”
The plan has four main infrastructure components: communications, surveillance, automation and facilities. It also outlines goals it seeks to complete in the next two to three years like replace old telecommunications, replace 618 radars, address runway safety and build six new air traffic control centers.
“It’s a very antiquated system,” said Rob Mark, a retired pilot, former air traffic controller and publisher of aviation blog Jetwhine. “$12.5 billion is serious money to most of us, but it is probably not enough to make this dream come true for Secretary Duffy. I think it’s going to be more than double that amount.”
Mark recalls being a controller during the 1981 strike, thinking things were antiquated back then. He concedes that “there are radars in places where there weren’t any before, but talk about using parts so old you can’t even find parts for them — this is insane.”
The U.S. isn’t the only nation struggling with their airspace industry.
French air traffic controllers are currently on strike over staffing shortages and aging equipment. That disruption plus the recent overseas incidents involving Air India’s Boeing 787 crash and South Korea’s Jeju Air crash may indicate a global problem.
Despite the unnerving headlines and heightened public discourse, people are flying more than ever. O’Hare International Airport just experienced one of its busiest days in 15 years with 1.54 million passengers over Independence Day weekend.
“It’s safe out there,” said Dennis Tajer, American Airlines pilot and spokesman for the Allied Pilots Association. “Professional pilots and air traffic controllers don’t deal in unsafe environments. When it’s like that, we get out of it.”
Tajer says the FAA’s shortcomings are decades in the making and simply “plain, poor planning” that was handed off from one administration to the next.
Pilots, said Tajer, are “under an immense amount of pressure,” as is the margin of safety. There are a lot of new people working in the airspace industry following mass retirements that occurred during the pandemic, and years of under-investment.
