Hope for the future

Does anyone still subscribe to "Flight Training"? I seem to remember
them publishing the "student starts" each month -- but I have no idea
where they got that info.
--
Jay Honeck

AOPA has pilot stats from 1929 thru 2005 but it is not broken down by
month. It was interesting to note that there has been an average of 80,000
student pilots in the US in the past decade but it was double that amount
in the early 1980's.
The total US pilot stat has not changed much since 1967 averaging 600,000.
We have the same amount of Private pilots today as we had in 1966 (220,000).

David - KGYH

FLAV8R wrote:
Does anyone still subscribe to "Flight Training"? I seem to remember
them publishing the "student starts" each month -- but I have no idea
where they got that info.
--
Jay Honeck


AOPA has pilot stats from 1929 thru 2005 but it is not broken down by
month. It was interesting to note that there has been an average of 80,000
student pilots in the US in the past decade but it was double that amount
in the early 1980's.
The total US pilot stat has not changed much since 1967 averaging 600,000.
We have the same amount of Private pilots today as we had in 1966 (220,000).

Which means that as a percentage of the population, we only have about
2/3rds as many private pilots now as in 1966. Not a good trend.

Matt

"Jay Honeck" wrote in news:1163767124.193662.166360
@e3g2000cwe.googlegroups.com:

I recently re-subscribed to "Plane & Pilot", and in this month's
edition they repeatedly refer to the "strong upswing in student starts"
that has fueled increased sales of (for example) the Diamond DA-40.

This is the first I've heard of this increase in pilot training, and I
hope it's the start of a trend. Anyone got a source for student stats?

It might come from AOPA. AOPA's been pushing their "Project Pilot" program
for about 6 months or so now. Certainly they are going to express the
feelings that the project is working, even if it may not be...

"tony" wrote in message
ups.com...
yes you are right


Tony - Your post triggered M$ Outlook Express 6.0 to prompt:

"To display language characters correctly you need to install the following
language pack: Chinese Simplified"

Huh???


Montbwack

"Montblack" wrote in message
...
Tony - Your post triggered M$ Outlook Express 6.0 to prompt:

"To display language characters correctly you need to install the
following
language pack: Chinese Simplified"

Huh???

From his message header:

Content-Type: text/plain; charset="gb2312"

"gb2312" is a commonly used Chinese language character set.

Personally, I think it's silly to use a foreign-language character set when
posting in English to a newsgroup that is essentially an English language
newsgroup (the only Chinese in Tony's post was the "wrote in message" part
of the quote). But not all users even comprehend that they are doing
so...often the language settings just default based on the user's global
computer settings, and the user doesn't know enough to override the default.

I'm guessing that's the case here. Hopefully, Tony doesn't actually believe
there's a reason to use Chinese characters in his posts, especially since
the content he's actually writing is in English, obviously targeted at
people who read English.

Pete

In article ,
says...


This is the first I've heard of this increase in pilot training, and I
hope it's the start of a trend. Anyone got a source for student stats?



I don't know about the stats.
I would share your hope for a trend, but I cannot be optimistic. Why?
Many people start flying, and stick to it through the costs and hardships
because of the rewards it is supposed to offer at the end. These rewards have
been substantially eroded over the years though, particularly in recent
(post-911) years.

1) The airline pilot's career will likely never have the shine it once had.
Salaries are down (WAY down, in some cases) job security as well, and the
"glamor" of intercontinental flying is tarnished.

2)Utility for the individual or small business flyer is diminished. In the
50's and early '60's it was easy to find personal aircraft with TAS
comparable to what were then considered to be airliners (DC-3's). This
combined with the proximity of local airports led to a prodigious utility
gain for those who could afford it. Today, unless you are talking bizzjets
and multi-million investments, it is difficult to find many missions where
the private aircraft offers a measurable advantage. (Yes these exist, but
they are now the exception rather than the rule).

3) Saftey concerns have increased. This is a good thing, because safety
conciousness is the driving force behind the improvement we have seen in
accident statistics. At the same time, this increases the hassle and
preparation time, and further decreases perceived utility.

4) Environmental conciousness - another good thing, that probably does not
help the overall image of private aviation.

5) Rules and regulations - not that these have increased that much over the
years in GA, but the amount of rule conciousness and responsibility we have
to digest in our daily lives has. Just driving your car to work today is an
exercise in liability protection - adding to this a "leisure" activity that
brings a whole new level of rules and regulations may not be a picture of
release and serenity to young people, already stressed half to death about
the responsibility they take on every time they climb out of bed in the
morning.

I do agree with those who say the new crop of aircraft, and the modernization
of the instrument panel represent big gains in attractiveness for potential
starters today, but I would be cautious about beliving in much of an upswing
in PPL starts.

GF

1) The airline pilot's career will likely never have the shine it once had.
Salaries are down (WAY down, in some cases) job security as well, and the
"glamor" of intercontinental flying is tarnished.

Yeah, I wonder what's going to happen when you project this trend out
20 years. With so few military pilots in the pipeline, and now fewer
privately trained pilots interested in pursuing flying as a career, the
stars seem aligned to create a huge pilot shortage in the year 2027 or
so... This should drive salaries back up, of course.

The glamor of international travel is all but gone. Mary and I have
talked extensively about flying to Europe, but each time we consider
the agony of flying across the Atlantic with the kids in a cattle car
we decide to fly our own plane somewhere. Between the discomfort of
commercial flying, and the famously less-than-welcoming attitude of
many Europeans, it's just easier to spend our tourist dollar in the
Western hemisphere. God knows there are plenty of places we haven't
yet seen on our side of the pond that are reachable in Atlas.

2)Utility for the individual or small business flyer is diminished. In the
50's and early '60's it was easy to find personal aircraft with TAS
comparable to what were then considered to be airliners (DC-3's). This
combined with the proximity of local airports led to a prodigious utility
gain for those who could afford it.

So true. I know that people in the 1950s were aware of what the
then-new interstate highway system was going to do to rail travel --
but I don't think anyone much considered what they would to to
aviation. Back when it took 8 hours to drive to Chicago from here,
flying your company's Twin Beech made a lot of sense. Now, it's a 4.5
hour drive, which most businessmen will do in a day, especially when it
saves hundreds of dollars to do so.

And, of course, everyone knows what happened to commuter air service.
With the advent of freeways, (and, more importantly, the loss of
airmail contracts) commuter air lines went the way of the dinosaur.
Let's hope the VLJs can bring it back!
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On 19 Nov 2006 06:02:18 -0800, "Jay Honeck" wrote
in .com:

The glamor of international travel is all but gone. Mary and I have
talked extensively about flying to Europe, but each time we consider
the agony of flying across the Atlantic with the kids in a cattle car
we decide to fly our own plane somewhere. Between the discomfort of
commercial flying, and the famously less-than-welcoming attitude of
many Europeans, it's just easier to spend our tourist dollar in the
Western hemisphere. God knows there are plenty of places we haven't
yet seen on our side of the pond that are reachable in Atlas.

While I share much of your criticism of airline travel, I have found
the lasting benefits of international travel significantly exceed the
relatively short periods of discomfort.

These rewards have been substantially eroded
over the years though, particularly in recent
(post-911) years.

Well, yes, but the hassle of flying commercially has increased far more
than the hassle of flying onesself (except in the DC area). My wife is
far more inclined even on longer trips now to propose taking the little
airplane rather than the aluminum tube.

While safety concerns have increased, ways to deal with them have too.
GPS and Nexrad are examples of this.

I don't think people are "stressed to death about the responsibility
they take on every time they climb out of bed". CYA is more built into
people's MO nowadays, but not in a stressful way (except perhaps as the
recipient).

An activity has to be fun and rewarding for it to be pursued. It still is.

Jose
--
"Never trust anything that can think for itself, if you can't see where
it keeps its brain." (chapter 10 of book 3 - Harry Potter).
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

In article ,
says...


These rewards have been substantially eroded
over the years though, particularly in recent
(post-911) years.

Well, yes, but the hassle of flying commercially has increased far more
than the hassle of flying onesself (except in the DC area). My wife is
far more inclined even on longer trips now to propose taking the little
airplane rather than the aluminum tube.



I do agree with this somewhat.
Certainly, the fact tht you have to just about strip naked to get on a plane
today, and you have to wait for hours as everyone else does the same is going
to be a big advantage for business aviation. (Not to mention the fact that
the threat of truly being blown out of the sky, while still remote, has
become more realistic - which may tip the scales for some CEO's, or their
risk-management departments).

But this still doesn't change the fact that it's really hard to eek any
demonstrable utility out of private aviation today. If your calculation
includes any cost-to-benefit consideration at all then you're right out the
window. If cost is of little concern, or pleasure is great enough to justify
it, then you still have to weigh-in the time and hassle to and from the
airports - and in many cases in the US it would simply be more convenient,
as Jay says, to drive it.

In Europe, the fast trains, combined with good roads, plus now the fact that
you can put your car on the train, is rapidly making even commercial aviation
obsolescent, let alone private flying, which is relegated pretty much to a
leisure activity.

GF