ZNY moving?

[ChrisDTC]

The article is conspicuously short on details, but given they are talking about 1000 FAA jobs on Long Island I assume they are referring to ZNY.

Officials Seek New FAA Facility at MacArthur - Hauppauge, NY Patch

 

[StuSEL]

This is a combo TRACON/Center that they want to build that would combine what is known today as N90 and ZNY. The new facility would be known as an ICF (Integrated Control Facility). I believe NATCA president Paul Rinaldi talked about this in his testimony to the House Transporation Subcommittee several weeks ago. If I recall correctly it was around the point where he was talking about facility consolidation.

NATCA released a statement about this on Monday. Untitled Page

There is already one of these in Honolulu, except the Honolulu Control Facility has a tower cab at the top.

 

[Bruther]

This would be a colossal waste of taxpayer's money.

 

[JulietMikeCharlie]

How is this a waste of money? Both facilities are aging and new ones are needed. So what's the differance if it's one facility or two?

 

[UNDgrad06]

I believe the FAA wants to do this across the country with about 6-8 facilities combining all the TRACONS and Centers in the country. There goal would be do this by 2034. I read up on this a few weeks back. The average age of a Center is 50 years and the cost of up keep is on the rise. Plus some of them sit on some decent land (like on long island in ZNYs case) and that is worth a nice hunk of cash.

There was a map of the proposed areas that I will try to find again.

 

[UNDgrad06]

Here is the PDF File

Page 12 for the proposed map. Lots of good information.

 

[Bruther]

ZNY is functioning. N90 is functioning. Why waste a billion dollars of taxpayer's money when this country is 16 trillion in debt on this disaster? They even have plans in this new facility for a lactating room, a gym and a rooftop lounge!

BTW, air traffic is way down...another reason not to go ahead with this boondoggle.

If a combination of these two facilities was really necessary (which it isn't) ZNY has enough room today to accomplish this without wasting a billion dollars on a new facility. They could actually throw ZBW in there as well.

 

[JulietMikeCharlie]

So ur plan is to wait for both facilities to literally fall apart...real smart

 

[Bruther]

My plan is to save the taxpayers a billion dollars on a project that is not necessary.

 

[JulietMikeCharlie]

Ok so instead wait untill the buildings are in disrepair and have to pay more later to build new facilities....great plan

 

[shaba169]

My plan is to save the taxpayers a billion dollars on a project that is not necessary.

Nahh we arnt going to waste taxpayer money, we are just going to use the cash we save every year by making you retire. :deadhorse:

 

[liondave]

Nahh we arnt going to waste taxpayer money, we are just going to use the cash we save every year by making you retire. :deadhorse:

OUCH! :rotf:
It's a win win situation-oh wait...

 

[Bruther]

That's not a very well thought out line of reasoning.

If you noticed, the FAA built a beautiful new building for its regional office in Jamaica, Queens a few years back. I guess that it replaced an older building that was ready to fall down, like supposedly ZNY and N90 are now. I can only imagine how much they spent on that building, which stands out for its elaborance like a sore thumb. The only problem is that shortly after they built this grandious building the FAA moved the regional office out of the state, leaving behind a mostly empty vestige of wasted taxpayers money.

Oh well, on to the next project!

 

[StuSEL]

The problem is that the report even says "Yeah, the TRACON consolidations aren't providing as many benefits as we thought, but we're going to go ahead and try consolidations with 30 more TRACONs and 2 centers and see what the hell happens." There is little logic provided that would support their decision right now. They need to work out the problems with consolidated TRACONs, or come up with a plan that maintains the current structure of the system.

I think de-modularizing TRACONs and centers is probably one of the biggest risks to air traffic security the FAA itself has created, which is something they will need to very seriously address. What if there's a bomb threat in one of the supercenters? Or an actual attack? They'd be shutting down 1/6th of radar control positions in the entire country assuming it requires a full facility evacuation. From this standpoint it doesn't make a lot of sense.

 

[Bruther]

There are also other risks. Like a cut fiber-optic cable knocking out radar and communications. There are also environmental risks, such as herbicide accidentally being infiltrated into the facility with the commensurate impact on a super-facility. Additionally, there are labor risks, such as a potentially run-away organization being able to blackmail the govt using more leverage than they previously had. Cost overruns are so prevalent in the FAA, that whatever numbers are being estimated would probably have to be multiplied by a factor of ten to be realistic. BTW, this project has been ongoing for the past 15 years with almost no real progress to show for it and hundreds of millions of dollars already wasted.

 

[thatdude11]

From what I'm hearing, neither ZNY nor N90 have any more room underneath their control room floors for any more cables, FIOS, lines, etc. Sure, the idea sounds like a huge chunk of taxpayer money, but you need to look at the long term in order to see the benefits. At some point, both of these buildings will need to be replaced, so why not build 1 building instead of 2. Also, you have 2 level 12 facilities on Long Island which requires the FAA to pay the controllers 10% CIP pay for each, putting the Long Island locality of 28.72% up to 38.72%. If you were to move the two facilities off the island to a place like Albany, you would be able to greatly reduce the locality adjustment, as well as completely eliminate the CIP pay. It would cost the gov't a ton in PCS money but over 30-50 years it would save a lot more.

 

[vic1218]

From what I'm hearing, neither ZNY nor N90 have any more room underneath their control room floors for any more cables, FIOS, lines, etc. Sure, the idea sounds like a huge chunk of taxpayer money, but you need to look at the long term in order to see the benefits. At some point, both of these buildings will need to be replaced, so why not build 1 building instead of 2. Also, you have 2 level 12 facilities on Long Island which requires the FAA to pay the controllers 10% CIP pay for each, putting the Long Island locality of 28.72% up to 38.72%. If you were to move the two facilities off the island to a place like Albany, you would be able to greatly reduce the locality adjustment, as well as completely eliminate the CIP pay. It would cost the gov't a ton in PCS money but over 30-50 years it would save a lot more.

You are not going to eliminate CIP because of the location. The biggest factor for CIP at facilities such as ZNY and N90 is that these are hard to staff facilities because of the complexity.

 

[UNDgrad06]

The sad thing is ZME already has a "Nursing Room". Its basically never used. Its stocked with a rocking chair, sink and mini fridge.

Anyway this is happening all across the country. You won't have to worry about cables being cut because we will be using satellites by then. The amount of money they have poured into a 60 year old ZME since I have been here has been outstanding. Some of these centers sit on decent property that could be sold and then you could by a nice chunk of land out in the country for a small percentage of the price.

 

[The Fold]

The sad thing is ZME already has a "Nursing Room". Its basically never used. Its stocked with a rocking chair, stink and mini fridge.

Anyway this is happening all across the country. You won't have to worry about cables being cut because we will be using satellites by then. The amount of money they have poured into a 60 year old ZME since I have been here has been outstanding. Some of these centers sit on decent property that could be sold and then you could by a nice chunk of land out in the country for a small percentage of the price.

I want to be the first to say "Oh, Bruther."

Additionally - There are many benefits to consolidating facilities, including the duplication in Tech Ops, HR, Payroll, Administration - which in the end will result in less overhead.

 

[rogersjf]

I want to be the first to say "Oh, Bruther."

Additionally - There are many benefits to consolidating facilities, including the duplication in Tech Ops, HR, Payroll, Administration - which in the end will result in less overhead.

Likewise it will include duplications of controllers, there will be a pot of more people to work and sech. which in turn could save taxpayers by scaling back OT