At the June 8 meeting of the San Jose City Council, my appointment to the SJ Int'l Airport Commission was among about 3 dozen appointments the council made to various city boards and commissions. Since then, some friends have asked a fair question, "What does this mean for you?"
It's a volunteer position
In San Jose, all the city boards and commissions are volunteer, unpaid positions. Yet it's also a position of public trust, under California's Brown Act about open public meetings. It means I'm getting more involved in my community in a topic that means a lot to me.
The San Jose Int'l Airport Commission is considered the panel of experts who advises the city council and airport staff on planning and operation of the airport. Since SJC is a part of the city government, not a separate district or entity, the city council is the final decision-making body. The Airport Commission can make advice, and even put items on the city council agenda. They are free to ignore the Airport Commission if they want. That means our advice needs to make sense and be convincing.
When there has been news about the airport over the past decade, including progress on construction, I have often referred to the Airport Commission's agendas and minutes on the sjc.org web site to get more details than the media reports. It's all public information.
6/14 meeting: Thanks to outgoing commissioners, congrats to incoming
My term doesn't begin until July 1, 2010. I attended the June 14 meeting as a citizen. I had also attended the April and May meetings - but didn't yet know at the time that my application to the commission was going to be accepted. This time, along with the other two new appointees Spencer Horowitz and George Gange who were also present at the meeting, we were congratulated on our appointments to the commission. Thank you very much everyone!
At the end of the meeting, there was a ceremonial item to thank Commissioner Sukhdev Bainiwal for the completion of 6 years (two terms) on the commission. Two terms is the limit, when other citizens get a turn. His fellow commissioners familiar with his work had many kind words. I also make it a point to thank volunteers for their efforts, and said so to him. He and the others were kind and enthusiastic in their congratulations to us new appointees to the commission.
Issues facing the airport
For the convenience of having a downtown airport, we have recurring issues to deal with including jet noise near homes and limits on building heights in downtown San Jose. These are not new. We just have to keep dealing with them. With that acknowledged up-front, I'll summarize some current issues.
The economy has hit the airport like everything else. At the June 14 Airport Commission meeting the presentation of the airport budget showed a lot of difficult cuts which had to be made to maintain a contractual level of "cost per enplanement" (CPE) which the airport had committed to the airlines upon beginning the Terminal B construction. With passenger enplanements more than 30% below projections in the down economy, costs had be slashed to match that. And if we don't see improvements in passenger traffic, there will be more painful cuts in 2011. There's some hope with the economy turning around in some sectors.
Restoring transoceanic airline routes
One thing that would help the enplanement totals is restoration of transoceanic airline routes at San Jose. We have two 11,000' runways following construction that completed in 2000. It's enough to handle 767, A330, 777, A340 or 747 transoceanic service. Yet the only international flights now are to Mexico on Mexicana and recently-added service by Volaris. The farthest domestic flights are Hawaiian (767s) to Honolulu, Alaska Air to Maui & Kona, and JetBlue to JFK & Boston. FedEx and UPS also fly heavy freight jets to the east coast.
SJC has previously served as a hub airport for Air California, Reno Air and American Airlines. American flew daily non-stops to Tokyo for 15 years until 2008, using a progression of heavy jets from DC-10 to MD-11 to 777-200ER. Briefly in 2001, American also had nonstops from San Jose to Taipei and Paris. The down economy led to the last of their pull-out from the former hub here. Now there are no airline hubs in San Jose. Southwest is our largest carrier. Southwest doesn't use a hub and spoke system. But at 475 flights/week last month it's a similar level of traffic to what some other airlines call hubs.
Currently US-based airlines have nearly all their transpacific flights from SFO or LAX. I think for now the challenge ahead of us is to attract a foreign carrier to add service here, with connections to airline alliance partners to help fill the planes. We're within easy 767/A330 range from all of Europe and 777/A340/747 and future 787/A350 range from Australia, Singapore or India. Southwest will be filling the brand-new Terminal B next month. It isn't a member of any overseas airline alliance. So nearly all the airlines that are members of any alliances will all be co-located, which they like for transfers, in Terminal A along with the international gates after Terminal C closes at the end of this month. Once we have some international carriers serving San Jose, we'll be in a better position to attract their US-based alliance partners to upgrade San Jose to at least a focus city.
One priority should probably be airlines which will be receiving the new Boeing 787 soon, starting with All-Nippon Airways (ANA) and Japan Airlines (JAL). The plane is the size of a Boeing 767 with the range of a 777ER. With the smaller aircraft, they're not making as big a commitment of seats as with a 777/A340. But we have the capacity for them to make that upgrade to the larger aircraft as demand develops. And they're planning those new routes right now.
We do have things going for us. Silicon Valley with its 2.4 million population and many high tech companies is recognized worldwide as a huge economic engine. San Jose is 1 million of that. So this gap in transoceanic service will certainly be filled sooner or later. Though I can only speak for myself, I know we prefer sooner. Compare the population with "that smaller city to the north" (as one of our local radio stations refers to San Francisco) which is 850K population. And with the protection of the 4000' Santa Cruz Mountains, we have a more inland climate not nearly as likely to get coastal low clouds as San Francisco.
When American had their nonstops to Tokyo, they marketed us as the "San Jose/Silicon Valley International Airport". It gets the point across. So it's still a good nickname for the airport.
More issues coming up... General Aviation and ground transportation.
In San Jose, all the city boards and commissions are volunteer, unpaid positions. Yet it's also a position of public trust, under California's Brown Act about open public meetings. It means I'm getting more involved in my community in a topic that means a lot to me.
The San Jose Int'l Airport Commission is considered the panel of experts who advises the city council and airport staff on planning and operation of the airport. Since SJC is a part of the city government, not a separate district or entity, the city council is the final decision-making body. The Airport Commission can make advice, and even put items on the city council agenda. They are free to ignore the Airport Commission if they want. That means our advice needs to make sense and be convincing.
When there has been news about the airport over the past decade, including progress on construction, I have often referred to the Airport Commission's agendas and minutes on the sjc.org web site to get more details than the media reports. It's all public information.
6/14 meeting: Thanks to outgoing commissioners, congrats to incomingMy term doesn't begin until July 1, 2010. I attended the June 14 meeting as a citizen. I had also attended the April and May meetings - but didn't yet know at the time that my application to the commission was going to be accepted. This time, along with the other two new appointees Spencer Horowitz and George Gange who were also present at the meeting, we were congratulated on our appointments to the commission. Thank you very much everyone!
At the end of the meeting, there was a ceremonial item to thank Commissioner Sukhdev Bainiwal for the completion of 6 years (two terms) on the commission. Two terms is the limit, when other citizens get a turn. His fellow commissioners familiar with his work had many kind words. I also make it a point to thank volunteers for their efforts, and said so to him. He and the others were kind and enthusiastic in their congratulations to us new appointees to the commission.
Issues facing the airport
For the convenience of having a downtown airport, we have recurring issues to deal with including jet noise near homes and limits on building heights in downtown San Jose. These are not new. We just have to keep dealing with them. With that acknowledged up-front, I'll summarize some current issues.
The economy has hit the airport like everything else. At the June 14 Airport Commission meeting the presentation of the airport budget showed a lot of difficult cuts which had to be made to maintain a contractual level of "cost per enplanement" (CPE) which the airport had committed to the airlines upon beginning the Terminal B construction. With passenger enplanements more than 30% below projections in the down economy, costs had be slashed to match that. And if we don't see improvements in passenger traffic, there will be more painful cuts in 2011. There's some hope with the economy turning around in some sectors.
Restoring transoceanic airline routes
One thing that would help the enplanement totals is restoration of transoceanic airline routes at San Jose. We have two 11,000' runways following construction that completed in 2000. It's enough to handle 767, A330, 777, A340 or 747 transoceanic service. Yet the only international flights now are to Mexico on Mexicana and recently-added service by Volaris. The farthest domestic flights are Hawaiian (767s) to Honolulu, Alaska Air to Maui & Kona, and JetBlue to JFK & Boston. FedEx and UPS also fly heavy freight jets to the east coast.
SJC has previously served as a hub airport for Air California, Reno Air and American Airlines. American flew daily non-stops to Tokyo for 15 years until 2008, using a progression of heavy jets from DC-10 to MD-11 to 777-200ER. Briefly in 2001, American also had nonstops from San Jose to Taipei and Paris. The down economy led to the last of their pull-out from the former hub here. Now there are no airline hubs in San Jose. Southwest is our largest carrier. Southwest doesn't use a hub and spoke system. But at 475 flights/week last month it's a similar level of traffic to what some other airlines call hubs.
Currently US-based airlines have nearly all their transpacific flights from SFO or LAX. I think for now the challenge ahead of us is to attract a foreign carrier to add service here, with connections to airline alliance partners to help fill the planes. We're within easy 767/A330 range from all of Europe and 777/A340/747 and future 787/A350 range from Australia, Singapore or India. Southwest will be filling the brand-new Terminal B next month. It isn't a member of any overseas airline alliance. So nearly all the airlines that are members of any alliances will all be co-located, which they like for transfers, in Terminal A along with the international gates after Terminal C closes at the end of this month. Once we have some international carriers serving San Jose, we'll be in a better position to attract their US-based alliance partners to upgrade San Jose to at least a focus city.
One priority should probably be airlines which will be receiving the new Boeing 787 soon, starting with All-Nippon Airways (ANA) and Japan Airlines (JAL). The plane is the size of a Boeing 767 with the range of a 777ER. With the smaller aircraft, they're not making as big a commitment of seats as with a 777/A340. But we have the capacity for them to make that upgrade to the larger aircraft as demand develops. And they're planning those new routes right now.
We do have things going for us. Silicon Valley with its 2.4 million population and many high tech companies is recognized worldwide as a huge economic engine. San Jose is 1 million of that. So this gap in transoceanic service will certainly be filled sooner or later. Though I can only speak for myself, I know we prefer sooner. Compare the population with "that smaller city to the north" (as one of our local radio stations refers to San Francisco) which is 850K population. And with the protection of the 4000' Santa Cruz Mountains, we have a more inland climate not nearly as likely to get coastal low clouds as San Francisco.
When American had their nonstops to Tokyo, they marketed us as the "San Jose/Silicon Valley International Airport". It gets the point across. So it's still a good nickname for the airport.
More issues coming up... General Aviation and ground transportation.
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