The article below from NYTimes.com has been sent to you by psa188@xxxxxxxxx /--------- E-mail Sponsored by Fox Searchlight ------------\ GARDEN STATE: NOW PLAYING IN NY & LA - SELECT CITIES AUG 6 GARDEN STATE stars Zach Braff, Natalie Portman, Peter Sarsgaard and Ian Holm. NEWSWEEK's David Ansen says "Writer-Director Zach Braff has a genuine filmmaker's eye and is loaded with talent." Watch the teaser trailer that has all of America buzzing and talk back with Zach Braff on the Garden State Blog at: http://www.foxsearchlight.com/gardenstate/index_nyt.html \----------------------------------------------------------/ F.A.A. Hopes to Clip Wings at Busy O'Hare August 5, 2004 By MATTHEW L. WALD WASHINGTON, Aug. 4 - Mixing threat and persuasion, the Federal Aviation Administration on Wednesday gathered dozens of executives from 15 airlines that fly into O'Hare International Airport and asked them to cut their schedules by about 5 percent to reduce delays so extensive that they ripple from Chicago through the whole country. Officials said they had never tried negotiating landing slots among so many airlines before. O'Hare can handle without delay 86 arrivals an hour from domestic airliners, and no more than 22 in any 15-minute period, but more than 40 are scheduled to arrive between 8 a.m. and 8:14 a.m., and much of the rest of the day is also overcrowded, the F.A.A. says. "The gridlock situation at O'Hare is not good for anyone," said Norman Y. Mineta, secretary of transportation. The F.A.A. is part of his department. Marion C. Blakey, the aviation agency administrator, said, "It's a problem we share and a problem we can solve together." Ms. Blakey spoke in a room filled mostly with reporters; the session here in Washington with the airline executives was held in private. But, she warned, if no agreement is reached, her agency will rely on its statutory authority "to assure the efficient use of the navigable airspace" and act unilaterally. The agency tried negotiation last year at O'Hare with United and American, which together account for more than three-quarters of the flights. This year the two airlines shifted some flights out of peak periods and canceled others, and O'Hare ran more smoothly for a while, but then other carriers added flights and the system bogged down again. Jeanne Medina, a spokeswoman for United, said that her airline had already cut 7.5 percent and that until O'Hare could be expanded, the solution was for others to cut their schedules, too. "We believe any cuts need to be equitable, across the board," Ms. Medina said. Uniform cuts seem unlikely, because some new carriers, like Independence Air, based at Dulles Airport in Virginia, are vowing to maintain service, and other carriers have only a handful of flights a day. Edward P. Faberman, executive director of the Air Carrier Association, which represents smaller airlines, said that American and United were responsible for the near-gridlock and that it would be wrong for the government to use that problem to prevent others from coming in. The F.A.A. is on untested legal ground and is tiptoeing around antitrust rules. With help from the Justice Department, it invented a system for Wednesday's meeting: after a group session, an F.A.A. official met individually with each airline and asked how many flights it would cut. The agency will sum up the cuts and see if they are adequate. An agreement among the airlines themselves to cut service would be illegal collusion, officials said. The effort at O'Hare may be a precedent for other airports. The agency is rationing access to La Guardia in New York, with a lottery of landing slots, but is looking for an alternative. Last week it held a meeting with airlines to discuss other systems, including an auction of landing rights, a concept the airlines oppose. The problem at La Guardia and O'Hare is that the F.A.A. and the airports have been unable to expand capacity fast enough to meet demand. Adding to the problem, many carriers are retiring big jets and substituting smaller ones, so they can offer service more times a day. The result is often more planes carrying the same number of people. According to the aviation agency, on-time gate arrivals at O'Hare are running at under 68 percent this year, down from over 80 percent last year. Among delayed flights, 24 percent are by more than an hour; nearly 9 percent are by more than two. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/05/national/05traffic.html?ex=1092712821&ei=1&en=5ff2f713fdce4eb7 --------------------------------- Get Home Delivery of The New York Times Newspaper. Imagine reading The New York Times any time & anywhere you like! Leisurely catch up on events & expand your horizons. Enjoy now for 50% off Home Delivery! Click here: http://homedelivery.nytimes.com/HDS/SubscriptionT1.do?mode=SubscriptionT1&ExternalMediaCode=W24AF HOW TO ADVERTISE --------------------------------- For information on advertising in e-mail newsletters or other creative advertising opportunities with The New York Times on the Web, please contact onlinesales@xxxxxxxxxxx or visit our online media kit at http://www.nytimes.com/adinfo For general information about NYTimes.com, write to help@xxxxxxxxxxxx Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company