Airports located in one of the nation’s busiest flight training corridors are preparing to impose more fees that will, if implemented, have serious consequences on flight training, flight schools, and local pilots.
The landing fees, made possible by newly available automation of satellite data collection and invoicing, may be assessed as early as October 1 as local officials race to take advantage of a newly available opportunity.
The state contracted this year with a Florida company called Virtower to collect aircraft movement data at airports statewide. In February 2023, Virtower announced a “global strategic partnership” with Vector Airport Systems. Vector can use the Virtower data to provide automated invoicing services to county and municipal airports that assess landing fees, and Vector has been actively pitching its services to the airports.
In 2020, the FAA mandated ADS-B installation on general aviation aircraft operating in certain airspace. The equipage mandate and the data it provides was never intended to be used to collect fees, or to enable aircraft tracking by third parties. AOPA is considering legislative action to make sure ADS-B data is used solely for its intended purpose.
The proposed fees would be collected by not-for-profit, public-use airports, even when they already have a budget surplus. A preliminary review of available budgets suggests the airports are already operating at minimal expense to local taxpayers and receive federal grants that cover 90 percent of the cost for various projects. Yet they are rushing to finalize local approvals required to implement landing fees of $3 per 1,000 pounds for fixed-wing aircraft.
At a recent public meeting on the topic of landing fees DeLand’s Airport Manager John Eiff confirmed the intent of the fee is to deter traffic: “The primary reason we are even considering a landing fee is to protect ourselves from other airports that are signing up for this. We’ve got Orlando Executive, Kissimmee, Flagler, Ormond Beach and us that are considering landing fees. If we do not impose landing fees, airplanes that are using the other airports and paying landing fees, they will choose to come to DeLand and saturate our pattern to an unsafe level. For us to add a landing fee is kind of protection against this.”
City officials in DeLand had not yet approved the landing fee when Eiff emailed airport users August 27 to inform them that landing fees will be charged beginning October 1 for “itinerant aircraft.” The email discussed cost-sharing in general terms, but offered no financial specifics, such as the net revenue the airport generated for city taxpayers in 2023.
“Imposing new landing fees at public, not-for-profit airports, intended to deter operations that provide the lifeline for these airports seems illogical and will ultimately have safety consequences for pilots, and may violate federal grant assurances. Moreover, there may be additional legal issues with how these fees are being set, implemented and collected,” said AOPA Southern Regional Manager Stacey Heaton.
Four of the five airports currently contemplating whether to contract with Vector Airport Systems for automated landing fee assessment and invoicing based on ADS-B data have proposed the same fee: $3 per 1,000 pounds. (Executive Airport in Orlando has not yet publicly confirmed its intentions, though it was among nearly a dozen airports represented in regional meetings this year to discuss the new technology that makes landing fee automation possible.)
Public airports, much like the federal interstate highway system, receive substantial government funding to offset expenses incurred by state and local communities. These publicly funded assets are not supposed to become profit centers for state and local communities, and federal grants come with various requirements.
“The city and county governments considering these new landing fees have been conspicuously silent about the fact that these airports appear to be in good financial condition, and they’ve received $67 million in federal grants, collectively, over the past decade,” said Heaton. “This is misguided and stands to devastate the flight training industry and local Florida pilots.”
