Hacker News Reader

Slots have a very wide time range so thinking of them as "appointments" is entirely misleading.

Also airlines have been given waivers since the early 2000s because the FAA realized that they were simply operating empty "ghost flights" merely to keep their slots allocated to them. So we just give them waivers every year so they don't waste fuel on this stupidity.

The ATC/FAA model is entirely inappropriate for ports.

View on HN

That’s not the case globally. Heathrow for instance has strict slot time ranges. As does Schiphol.

Neither the UK nor the Netherlands choose to not enforce slot misuse. We’re not talking only about the US and the FAA as examples here.

Whether it’s an appropriate model for ports and especially truck traffic at ports is a different topic, one I’m not qualified to speak on. I was just pointing out the misconception on how airline traffic at airports works and how it’s certainly not just a first-come, first-served ad hoc model.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com