Transportation Secretary Requests $30 Billion More for Air Traffic Control Upgrades
U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy on Monday made official his request for an additional $30 billion for sweeping air traffic control and airport upgrades.
Duffy previewed his ask in a speech to the Aero Club of Washington last week, but on Monday he appealed directly to Congress, arguing that the ambitious ATC overhaul his department initiated last year, known as BNATCS, will not reach its full potential without the new round of funding.
“To finish what we started, we need more money,” the secretary said at a press conference at St. Louis Lambert International Airport.
He was joined by FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford, representatives from ALPA, NATCA, and Airlines for America, and Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., who on Monday introduced a bill called the Modern Skies Act to authorize the funding.
Congress approved $12.5 billion for BNATCS last year through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. At the time, the DOT described this tranche as a “down payment” on a total program outlay of about $31.5 billion, leaving $19 billion still to appropriate. But the federal government now believes that it will take $30 billion on top of the money already allocated, bringing the total projected BNATCS price tag to $42.5 billion, more than $10 billion over initial estimates.
Duffy said he wants to commit $10 billion each to new ATC architecture and software; new infrastructure, including ATC towers, runways, and taxiways; and improvements for mid-sized airports, which he said often struggle to secure private funding.
President Donald Trump supports and is also asking for the $30 billion, Duffy clarified to reporters. He said members of Congress should consider it a “joint” ask, with the White House’s full backing.
The DOT’s modernization campaign is already underway, with contractors installing new technology, such as digital voice switches, and replacing old copper telecommunications lines with fiber, satellite, and wireless connections. But Duffy said the federal government must move much faster, and at a larger scale, to deliver tangible benefits to the flying public.
At the current rate, he said, it would take about 300 years to replace all of the nation’s ATC towers, a timeline he called “unacceptable.”
Duffy acknowledged that some in Congress are reluctant to approve more money for the project after the failure of the NextGen program, which also aimed to modernize the national airspace, but warned that outages and other failures will continue to pile up if nothing is done.
“If you don’t want to do it now, when do you want to do it?” he asked.
Duffy said that the core infrastructure upgrades envisioned by BNATCS could be completed by 2028. The construction of new towers and comprehensive upgrades for airports will take much longer, he acknowledged.
