DOT Moves Airline Statistics Office to Bureau of Transportation Statistics

Contact DOT 116-95 Roslyn Kaiser 202-366-5571 Timothy E. Carmody 202-366-9059

Wednesday, June 21, 1995 -- The U.S. Department of Transportation today announced that the Office of Airline Statistics has been transferred to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) from the department's Research and Special Programs Administration.

Dr. T. R. Lakshmanan, Director of BTS, noted that "This action reflects the Clinton Administration's and Transportation Secretary Federico Pe¤a's commitment to reinventing government by streamlining operations. BTS, established in December 1992 as a multi-modal statistical agency,is a natural location for the airline statistical functions."

The office will be renamed the Office of Airline Information (OAI) to emphasize its role in providing accurate data, data analysis and customer services. Dr. Lakshmanan said, "The transfer comes at a time of tremendous change, due to deregula- tion of the airline industry and the information revolution. This creates new challenges and opportunities for the office, which must provide data for new needs in a manner that matches the current state of technology."

OAI collects and analyzes airline passenger, cargo, traffic and financial data. This information provides the government with consistent and comprehensive economic and market data on individual airline operations and is used in negotiating international bilateral aviation agreements. It also is valued greatly by the aviation, travel and tourism communities for such things as measuring on-time performance, denied boarding information and market analysis of trends.

Timothy E. Carmody has been named acting director of the new BTS office, located in Room 4125, K-25, BTS, Department of Transportation, 400 7th Street, S.W., Washington, D.C. 20590-0001. The transfer became effective May 28, 1995.