Scheme raises costs

0 Comments | USA TODAY, January, 2008 | by James C. May

Let's be clear: No one cares more deeply about the problem of delays in our nation's aviation system than the airlines do. Delays make doing business more difficult and cost our customers and companies billions of dollars every year.

The solution to those delays is clear. As we have been urging Congress and the administration, we must move aggressively to deploy a satellite-based, modern airspace management system and finance that system on a fair and equitable cost-sharing basis. The Department of Transportation's congestion pricing scheme, by definition, is an effort to raise consumer costs for air travel and thereby limit demand. It is heading in exactly the wrong direction.

Congestion pricing could have some superficial appeal. In the world of highways,...