The Indelible Bonobo Experience

But the board’s report didn’t rest the entire blame on federal fees and taxes. It also noted that Canadian carriers are less competitive than their U.S. counterparts. This is due to their higher labour, fuel and aircraft ownership costs as well as lower aircraft utilization contributing roughly 50% of the cost differential with their U.S. counterparts. Airport fees amounted to 25% of the difference, the board said. Combined this left Canadian carriers at a 30% cost disadvantage to their U.S. counterparts, leading to higher fares. (via fp)

• Canadian carriers are less competitive than their U.S. counterparts. This is due to their higher labour, fuel and aircraft ownership costs as well as lower aircraft utilization contributing roughly 50% of the cost differential with their U.S. counterparts. Airport fees amounted to 25% of the difference, the board said. Combined this left Canadian carriers at a 30% cost disadvantage to their U.S. counterparts, leading to higher fares.
• there are also a lot of questions about whether the highly subsidized U.S. airport system is sustainable given the current economic situation there, said Vijay Gill, who authored the report.
• “We have a viable system, and they don’t,” he said in an interview. “The U.S. does not have a fully-funded infrastructure. They’re subsidizing it … there’s also a huge gap that they’re going to have to make up somehow.” Mr. Gill said the U.S. will be likely be left with a choice between increasing its airport subsidies, or increasing their own airport fees.
• in the early 1990s, the operations of country’s largest airports were handed over to various airport authorities so that they could be run in a more business-like manner. The federal government, however, retained ownership of the land the airports sat on, and has been charging them rent, which is passed onto flyers as a user fee. An estimated $2.5-billion has been collected from the country’s various airport authorities since, which has become a bone of contention for Canadian carriers as well. (..) ground rents average about $3 a passenger nationally, ranging from 77¢ a person in Edmonton to $4.63 a person at Pearson.

See also 5 million Canadians a year cross border to catch cheaper flights

For those captivated by the possibilities of human-powered transportation, the goal is glamorous: flying a human-powered helicopter for at least 60 seconds, reaching a height of three metres at least once during the flight. The reward itself, offered by the American Helicopter Society, has broader appeal: the highly-competitive $250,000 Igor I. Sikorsky Prize, named for the pioneering Russian-American aviator. (via Human-powered helicopter: Toronto engineers aiming to win elusive Sikorsky flight prize - thestar.com)

• If the helicopter’s specifications are pinpoint accurate, optimizations perfect and the team’s pride of purpose operates at full throttle — indeed if all goes according to plan and they soar to three metres — they might just accomplish a feat to which no one has come close in the Sikorsky Prize’s 32-year history.
• But Toronto-based AeroVelo, the engineering collective behind the project, dubbed Atlas, faces stiff competition. TheUniversity of Maryland’s Gamera IIhelicopter set a U.S. flight record of 49.9 seconds last June and is also expected to test for the prize later this month.
• Until this year, no team had got their human-powered helicopter off the ground since 1994. With AeroVelo ready to test this week, never before have two teams been in this tight a competition for the elusive prize.
• “We would definitely like to be first,” said Atlas’ 25-year-old chief structural engineer, Cameron Robertson. “The fact that there has been this competition is really a driver. We’ve been keeping a closer eye on (Maryland). We can’t afford mistakes.”
• AeroVelo will not reveal design specs or allow photographs of the assembled helicopter.
• Maryland, which publishes pictures, video and design features online, takes a softer stance. “If (AeroVelo is) smart and they can pick up what we’ve done, then they deserve to be number one; I don’t think we ever thought about competition,” said Inderjit Chopra, director of the university’s Alfred Gessow Rotorcraft Center.

The bicycle that might.. :)

Safety experts are stunned after a passenger plane filled with smoke while trying to land at a snowy Denver International Airport, but the air traffic controller dismissed the call for help from the pilot as “B.S.” (via Pilot Requests Emergency Landing, Tower Calls ‘B.S.’ - ABC News)

..air travel is so much fun!