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Summary

To enhance capacity and reduce delays at our Nation’s congested airports, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is implementing Performance-Based Navigation (PBN) flight procedures, which can potentially provide significant near-term benefits such as improved on-time aircraft arrival rates and greater fuel savings. However, airline representatives have expressed concerns with the lengthy process for developing and implementing new PBN flight procedures. In 2010, FAA’s NAV Lean Project established 21 recommendations to streamline FAA’s policies and processes for new procedures.

FAA has deployed PBN procedures and has key projects under way, including adding new procedures at 13 major metropolitan areas. However, use of high-value procedures remains low, particularly at busy airports such as those in the New York City area. Several obstacles hinder FAA’s efforts to increase implementation and use of PBN procedures, including outdated controller policies, the lack of standard training for pilots and controllers, and the lack of automated controller tools. In addition, the NAV Lean Project has not met stakeholder demand for improved flight procedure development processes. FAA has completed 9 of the 21 NAV Lean recommendations and is making progress on the remaining ones. However, some of the most complex recommendations remain, and industry will not get NAV Lean’s full benefits until FAA implements all recommendations, currently planned for September 2015.

We made three recommendations to help FAA mitigate barriers to PBN implementation and expedite the development of new procedures.