Executives and celebrities bring pileups to airports- Austin American-Statesman

Source: Bloomberg.com
By: Aaron Kuriloff

Parking a car in the Phoenix area during today's Super Bowl will be hard enough. Try finding a place to put your plane.

Stan Raskow says he and about 200 other pilots who use Glendale Municipal Airport were told they would have to relocate their planes for a week.

The airport, three miles from University of Phoenix Stadium, needs to accommodate private jets flying in corporate chiefs and the well-heeled for the National Football League's title game.

Along with $4,300 tickets and hour long security lines at the game, fans on private planes could face traffic jams at local airports within 30 miles of the stadium. Corporate air travel to the game has surged.

"Some of these jets cost upward of $40 million apiece,'' said Matthew Wright, general manager for Atlantic Aviation at Phoenix Deer Valley Airport, about 20 miles from downtown. "Their owners probably feel some kind of entitlement, and they probably are entitled, to some extent.''

The Arizona host committee expects 800 to 1,000 private jets, or more, to use the airports before the game.

The football game attracts more corporate chiefs and their clients and colleagues in small planes than almost any other sporting event, said Robert Tuchman, founder of TSE Sports & Entertainment. His company specializes in corporate travel to events such as the Super Bowl, the Masters golf tournament and the Daytona 500.

Tuchman started making reservations at Phoenix area airports months ago.

"We're sending over 1,000 corporate executives to the Super Bowl this year,'' Tuchman said.

Regional airports and their service providers have spent months upgrading facilities and preparing for the influx. Atlantic Aviation just completed renovating its building at Deer Valley.

Ten to 20 private planes take off and land on an average day this time of year, Wright said. He estimates the number will reach 225 today. He's pitching a tent between hangars, rolling out a big-screen television and hosting a barbeque for pilots and crews.

Phoenix-based Rightpath Limited's facility at Glendale Airport recently opened a renovated facility with luxury passenger lounges with plasma televisions and a concierge service. As for the Glendale airport's mandate that regularly parked planes be relocated, Raskow said he and about 80 pilots formed the Glendale Pilots Association and pressed the airport to change its plans.

The airport agreed to make relocation voluntary, found spaces for some planes at neighboring airports and offered incentives to move, Raskow says.

Now Raskow's group is helping the airport prepare for the game and asking pilots not to fly, to reduce congestion, he says.

New York Giants co-owner Steve Tisch, who traveled to Phoenix by corporate jet, said the biggest air traffic problem doesn't happen in the days leading up to the game.

"When that game's over and a lot of people who've flown on private planes want to go home and everybody feels that they're entitled to be the first to take off, that's when it gets interesting,'' Tisch said "A lot of people are saying to their pilots to tell the tower, 'Do you know who I've got on my plane?' ''