President Joe Biden has signed the FAA Reauthorization Bill. Baton Rouge Congressman Garret Graves had a major part in crafting the legislation. He says it’s good news for Louisiana travelers. One focus of the bill is to improve the overall experience for airline customers. Graves says that means everything from the baggage claim to air traffic control.
“When a family goes to an airport this entire experience may have ten different vendors that family is engaging with. So no one is thinking about that cumulative experience of the family.”
The bill has consumer protections in place that would offer the option for customers to get paid in cash instead of airline credits and that would be at the discretion of the customer..
“This legislation actually requires passengers be offered a full reimbursement for travel if they have major delays or inconveniences.”
One cause of those delays is not enough air traffic controllers to manage flights. Graves says this bill also addresses that and looks to recruit and hire more Air Traffic Controllers and reduce the bottleneck of delays around the county.
“This bill helps to increase the number of Air Traffic Controllers and the training facility. It helps to create job training programs for flight attendants, plane mechanics and pilots. those are other shortages today, but looking on the horizon in the next few years we are going to see mass retirements.”
The bill also has $24.9 million for funding the Airport Improvement Program to update not just runways but terminals and overall customer experience.
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