scott moore wrote:
Ps. While I am offending everyone, if user fees begin, a good
start would be to close down the FSS system COMPLETELY, and fire all
of the employees.

The system is useless, redundant with more modern methods, and would
remove an entire line item from the FAA budget, leaving them less
to bitch about. Not to mention letting the FAA know we are serious
about reducing the size of the FAA.

For the most part, I agree.

About the only function of FSS that I use on a regular basis is flight
watch. I don't see any way to automate that. But, it certainly could be
centralized. I'm already talking to a person 100s of miles away; what
difference does it make where he's sitting? And what difference does it
make if he's sitting at a radio console in a building that says "FSS" on
the door or one that says "ATC" on the door?

Routine dissemination of weather information is better done by automated
methods. Likewise with filing of flight plans (VFR or IFR). Obtaining
clearances at uncontrolled airports via FSS is equally silly; they just act
as a telephone relay to ATT. The phone call could just as easily have been
switched to ATC directly.

Once in a while, I'll call FSS and ask for a phone briefing. Most commonly
these days, I'll do that on my cell phone in the car driving to the airport
because I was to busy to get a DUATS briefing before I left. While I'll
miss that convenience, I can't see any way I can justify the cost to the
federal government of having a person read me stuff on the phone that I
could have just as easily read myself on DUATS had I been a little more
organized or a little less lazy.