I’m very curious about the ‘substantial land fees’ associated with landing at major airports.
What would a ballpark figure be? $500? $5000? More?
Thanks
Depends on the Cessna. A 172 will stall at around 42 knots depending on configuration. For a short-field landing 55 knots on approach would be quite comfortable. If the carrier was moving into wind at 30 knots and you had a 20 knot headwind, your landing distance would be approximately zero.
Most of the cost comes from parking and fuel charges by the fixed-base operators (like service stations), who’d really rather not be bothered with something smaller than a business jet. At Boston Logan, for instance, the landing fee for a light single is only something like $27 (I’ve never done it), but you’ll pay hundreds to park and hundreds more to refuel. The US is a great bargain by world standards, though. In Europe, hardly any private citizen can afford even ATC fees for instrument flight, much less landing rights at any airport worthy of the name. Many countries have effectively no private aviation at all.
Fees for airliners and commercial aircraft are based on their weight. At Logan, it’s $4.75 per 1000 lb, which is in the range of $5-10K or so for a single-aisle, several times that for a 747.
That’s true, lots of aviation services are free in the US that are not free elsewhere.
Hang on, what? What fees for instrument flight? I’m not sure what counts as “an airport worthy of the name”, but landing at regional airports typically costs me around €20. And of course there are lots and lots of places where I can land for free.
Suppose I’m an eccentric billionaire (i.e. money is not an issue) and decide I absolutely want to land my Cessna in Atlanta or at LAX, even though it’s not an emergency. Does the airport have the right to tell me to get lost, or are there FAA rules saying they have to accomodate me?
Does it make a difference if the airport is very busy with no open slots, vs. being in a lull and they can easily fit me into the traffic pattern?
Or is this one of those things with no clearcut rules, where the answer will depend on the mood of the particular air traffic controller you happen to be speaking to?
It’s a public airport - you have just as much entitlement to land there as the 747 behind you, and the controllers have no reason to discriminate against you. They don’t work for the airport.
I just want to emphasise that you don’t have to be a billionaire to land at Atlanta (or JFK). Here’s a message board discussion that mentions landing light aircraft at both those airports:
Unfortunately this discussion is 4 years old, but still, one person landed at KATL for $30 and one person landed at KJFK for $25.
That entire paragraph you partially quoted is all kinds of fucking awesome.
Flying by instrument flight rules entitles you to services from ATC that VFR flights don’t get. The extra service comes with a price tag.
Could we clarify which country or countries we are talking about?
I am not a pilot that flies into busy airports but I have flown through Boston Logan’s airspace with an instructor on a number of occasions. A Private Pilot’s license allows you to land legally at any airport although there are some lower licenses like Sport Pilot where this is not the case. A controller does not have to allow you to transition and airspace in route from one airport to another. They can vector you around it or just tell you to stay clear of it on your own. They can also refuse special landing requests like deciding you want to shoot some touch and go practice landings if they can’t accommodate you. However, I don’t think they they can refuse a Full Stop landing request just because of the size of your plane. I am willing to be corrected on that but but announcing JFK or O’Hare as your final destination will make them work you into the traffic pattern especially if you are on an IFR flight plan and don’t just decide to drop in. The largest airports usually have parallel runways including some ones used for smaller aircraft so it isn’t like you would be competing directly for a landing slot with a 747.
Correct. Aircraft carriers are typically moving fairly quickly so landing in the direction they are moving makes it quite possible to land a small plane on the deck without the need of arresting wires. Add in some headwind and the landing speed for a small plane relative to the deck is very low. Flight Simulator X (which can be very accurate at full realism settings) has a challenge mission based on this scenario and getting stopped on the deck isn’t that hard even in a plane that is much larger than typical private planes.
Dad and I were flying up to Oregon one day, and we stopped off someplace in Northern California to say hi to a friend. She said that she’d flown into a large airport (SFO? I don’t remember.) in a Cessna, and the tower asked her to expedite her landing as there was a Boeing behind her. She called back, ‘Tell him to watch my wake!’ 
Pilots are an interesting bunch. They tend to look out for each other. My son was landing a Cessna 172 in Portland, ME. He’s on the radio and the 737 that was coming in to land was giving him priority. Everything was cool as if they were of equal priority.
It’s an interesting subculture. Not like the road rage idiots that we all experience on the highways who take it as an insult if you merge into traffic.
From the link posted by hibernicus:
I’ve transited controlled airspace over a military base, and been right seat in a Beechcraft Baron taking off and landing at Minneapolis-St. Paul. I never had to fly in high-speed traffic, though.
For those who have, how do you land a C172 at 120kts? I always figured you’d cross the threshold at 25 feet and 120kts, pull the power and bleed off airspeed until you’re slow enough to land the same as usual. Is there more to it than that?
Landed a C-310 At DFW, Atlanta, Chicago, All 4 of the biggies in Miami, and on & and on… VFR, IFR whatever.
Back in the 1970’s, ( Hobby was the main airport ) I was routinely cleared to land my C-180 on 17 & hold sort of 12R …
This with an airliner on a collision course if I did not get it done. Bawahahhaa
It the tower knew you and what you could do and liked you, they would let you do most anything that helped with traffic flow.
Little planes 99% of the time do not have a good reason to go to the big airports so you don’t see it much …
What you can do & what you should do are usually 2 different things in aviation…
Be polite, plan ahead, say please and don’t surprise anyone and 99% of the time they will work with you…
It varies, some countries the charge is passed to the user some countries it’s not. I know it’s user pays in Australia, I don’t know about the US. The poster I was replying to was replying to a post referring to Europe.
FYI **Richard **… In the US it’s all taxpayer pays. All of ATC and airspace is 100% cost-free to the user.
And right now there’s a big political fuss going on over that. Some of Congress wants to introduce user fees & offload ATC costs from the general taxpayer. The FAA is sorta behind the idea because they want a steady funding stream, not the current annual budgetary game of insane chicken.
So the airlines, the bizjets, and the little guys’ lobbying groups are each fighting hard to make sure they pay the least, while not being relegated to second class service when paying second class rates. It’s not pretty.
Back to the OP from the airline POV in the US:
Light planes are 100% welcome at all but the very busiest places at the busiest times. At airline hub airports they’re rare, but not unheard of. At airline non-hub airports they’re pretty common. At the 4 slot-controlled airports (JFK, LGA, DCA, ORD) there is a bit more rigamarole for both bizjets and lightplanes to operate. But they can.
ATC has ways of slipping slow planes into the mix, at least when the weather is nice. Between using different runways, having the light plane making a tight approach and generally flying aggressively, the impact of a lightplane arrival can be no worse than that of 2 jet arrivals. Except for the big 4 airports, rarely is an airport so busy on a nice day that it can’t accomodate one more aircraft some time in the next few minutes.
From the jet POV, we just leave a bunch more space ahead of us knowing we’re gonna be eating him/her up all the way to a stop. Often we can’t slow sooner than normal without interfereing with the jet behind. So we do our normal thing & rely on the excess spacing ahead to make it work.
If the weather is really poor at a busy hub, the lightplane will be told by ATC it’ll be awhile (like an hour) before they can be fitted in. If they can wait, though, they’ll be served. If not, they’ll go someplace more welcoming.
And as noted by others above, all bets are off in an emergency. If the lightplane needs a runway NOW, we’ll all get out of the way as needed while ATC shepards the emergency to the front of the line.
Cost:
As I said in the first part of this post, in the US, airplane owners & pilots don’t pay for ATC services. Other countries operate some or all of ATC more like toll roads; you pay for what you use.
“Landing fees” are charged by the entity which owns the airport. Usually that’s the local city or county or a similar regional government authority. Small airports usually have none, or at least none assessed on light planes, while airline hub & bigger airports often do. As noted by others above, even at big airports it’s a pretty nominal charge for small planes.
Parking & fueling services are sold by private operators; the equivalent of the local gas station / repair garage that used to be commonplace before we all switched to buying our car gas at convenience stores. Those folks are free to charge ridiculous prices. And do so at the big airports where their 99.8% clientele is bizjets.
Belated addition: As somebody noted above, the TSA has banned lightplanes from DCA. For a few years after 9/11 they’d banned bizjets as well. I *think *that’s been lifted for bizjets now.
But those are not a matter of airport management or ATC restriction.
The company I worked for in mid-1970’s had an emergency in Germany and, to expedite catching a Lufthansa LAX --> Frankfurt flight, flew me San Jose --> LAX in a 4-seater. (I was not being paid commensurate with my expertise: the expenses of this weekend trip probably added up to several months of my salary! :smack: )
As the 4-seater approached the airport a 747 emerged from a cloud ascending straight at us. We banked vigorously; the 747 banked vigorously; as we waved to the passengers on the other plane the controller said on the radio “Cessna so-and-so, you have a wide-body aircraft at 12 o’clock.”
All these years later, I still remember the pilot’s cool reply. “I have him in sight.”
(Pilot had a phone call waiting for him in general aviation terminal. ATC did not want a report filed.)
I have landed a Cherokee at JFK.
The only issues are that the controllers have to make a space for you among the big jets. The wake turbulence is a hazard, and it can be tricky for them to create enough of a buffer between you and them. When going IFR, it’s an airport like any other. Doing it VFR without prior notice is a little trickier depending on how busy it is at the time. But if you’re patient and polite with the controllers it’s doable.