NEW YORK -- Concerned about what it called a deteriorating air travel system and lack of leadership in Washington, the Travel Industry Association is laying the groundwork, with new research and an industry summit, to push the government harder for corrective action sooner rather than later.
The TIA said that the hassles of air travel have become such an issue that 28% of all air travelers avoided at least one trip in the past year, for a total of 41 million air trips that did not happen.
Roger Dow, the TIA's president and CEO, said those skipped trips translated into a $26.5 billion hit to the economy in the form of lost spending on various travel components and in the $4.2 billion in taxes that governments at all levels might have collected.
Dow, calling the estimates conservative, said they didn't even take into consideration the lost business opportunities or other economic activity that might have occurred.
In addition, the TIA cited a recent Congressional report that air traffic delays cost the economy another $41 billion in 2007.
In its research the TIA said that although most of the skipped trips were for leisure, 12 million would have been business trips.
Another 26% avoided at least one air trip by substituting another transport mode.
The TIA summarized additional findings:
- Consumers thought air travel safety and security were improving but gave the system black marks for efficiency and reliability.
- Traveler frustration was aimed at the overall air travel system rather than the airlines.
- Those who traveled most frequently were the most dissatisfied.
- Travelers were not optimistic about prospects for improving the system soon.
Dow said, by its inaction and failure to lead, "Washington gives Americans more reasons not to travel," something the country does not need, especially when rising fuel prices introduce still another deterrent.
"The time to act is now," Dow said. "Travelers are voters, but Washington is ignoring the problem."
With these research results in hand, the TIA is calling an emergency summit for travel industry leaders, for June 17 in Washington, to determine the next steps for moving the issue forward.
The list of invitees is a who's who of top executives from nearly 30 industry associations, including AAA, the Air Transport Association, the American Association of Airport Executives, ASTA, IATA, the American Hotel and Lodging Association, the Air Traffic Control Association and the National Tour Association.
Dow said the TIA "anticipates being at the center of this policy discussion" and expects to work with Congress to see that talk turns to action.
Research results
The TIA research, conducted in early May by Peter D. Hart Research and the Winston Group, produced a number of statistics describing attitudes and experiences of travelers.
All interview subjects were air travelers who made at least one air trip in the previous year. The survey also captured data for "frequent travelers," defined as having made at least three air trips the previous year; and for "very frequent travelers," defined as having made at least five air trips in the past year. The last group included only 21% of air travelers but accounted for 65% of all trips.
According to the research study, 62% of all travelers believe the air travel system is deteriorating, but even more, 78%, said it was in need of some correction or simply broken.
A third of all air travelers are dissatisfied with the system, but 48% of very frequent travelers are dissatisfied, creating an unusual situation where the best customer is the least happy customer, said Allan Rivlin, a partner at Hart Research.
Travelers' top concerns are delays, cancellations and inefficient security screening. According to Rivlin, 53% said that delays and cancellations was the area most in need of improvement; 36% cited getting through security; and 26% cited collecting their checked baggage. Smaller percentages complained about checking in (17%) and their in-flight experience (15%).
Thirty-nine percent of all air travelers believe their time is not respected in the process, but 51% of the very frequent travelers made that complaint.
When consumers were asked to choose two or three adjectives from a list of eight to describe the air travel experience, "frustrating" and "convenient" each were cited the most, about 40% of the time. But among the most frequent travelers, 52% called air travel frustrating and only 32% called it convenient.
When comparing the air travel experience with other travel-related activities, travelers gave the air segment the poorest grade. More than half (56%) said the air part of the trip ranged from "somewhat bad" to "the worst." Renting a car and eating meals away from home were rated poor experiences by 19% and 18% of respondents, respectively.
'Welcome to the picnic'
While they see the need for improvements, travelers are about evenly split on the likelihood of change in the next few years. However, the most frequent travelers are the least hopeful: 58% think improvements are unlikely.
Two-thirds of travelers said they trusted the airlines to make improvements, but smaller percentages trusted the federal government (51%) and airports (48%) to make changes.
Two-thirds also said the presidential candidates were paying too little attention to this issue.
Commenting on the research, Air Transport Association President James May said: "Welcome to the picnic."
He added, "The TIA survey reveals what ATA has been saying for years; that we have an aging air traffic control system that is in desperate need of replacement.
"We appreciate TIA's involvement in finding ways to improve the passenger travel experience and we look forward to working with them on the various initiatives that we already have put before Congress, FAA and others."
He urged the TIA to join the airlines in asking for "immediate" government action on key initiatives to improve all aspects of air travel, including a redesign of the New York region airspace to reduce delays.
To contact the reporter who wrote this article, send e-mail to Nadine Godwin at [email protected].