Predictions for the future of aviation as Cruising Altitude departs

• Experts predict the aviation industry will face challenges with air traffic control modernization and airport capacity.
• Airlines are increasingly focusing on premium passengers, which could lead to higher airfares for all travelers.

Cruising Altitude has been a weekly column about air travel. Thanks for reading along!

I’ve gotten to do some pretty cool things as an aviation journalist. I flew with Delta Air Lines’ last 747 to a storage facility in the Arizona desert. I competed against colleagues to earn the most frequent flyer miles on a whirlwind trip to Bangkok. I got to join a NASA research flight measuring the particle emissions from sustainable aviation fuel in a full day of flying over Montana, just to name a few. 

I’ve also had the privilege of highlighting the importance of flight accessibility for all travelers and tracking the progress airlines and regulators have made toward making flying easier for everyone. 

And of course, I had the honor of writing this column every week for more than three years.  

But after logging all those hours in the left seat of Cruising Altitude, it’s time for the next professional adventure. This is my column’s final flight, and I’m winding down my time on the staff at USA TODAY. 

I used it as an opportunity to check in with a few of my regular sources – names you’ll surely recognize – to see where everyone thinks the aviation industry is headed in the years to come. 

People had a lot of different ideas about what could happen for travelers in the next five to 10 years or so, but some common themes emerged in every conversation: the importance of modernizing air traffic control and making it more efficient, the ongoing push for premium passengers across the industry, the difficulty of achieving real sustainability gains and more. 

Aviation has always been an extremely dynamic sector, so it’s hard to ever say exactly what the next year looks like, let alone in the next decade. But here’s what the experts say are some of the trends they’re keeping their eyes on. 

Capacity 

The capacity crunch at airlines can take many different forms, but it’s been a durable problem in the industry since the COVID-19 pandemic-era recovery. First, it was pilot shortages and ongoing delays at manufacturers, but these days, it’s mostly the result of an overstretched air traffic control system and airports that are maxed out. 

Here’s what the experts are saying: 

• If you live in New York, if you fly out of O’Hare, if you fly out of DCA, if you fly anywhere in the Northeast with air traffic control, there’s no room for expansion ... There are plenty of gleaming new terminals being built and they’re very expensive and they’re going to raise the cost to operate, but there aren’t new runways being built and that is a problem for future growth. I have some hope that there will be improvements in air traffic control – Brett Snyder, author of the blog Cranky Flier and owner of the travel agency Cranky Concierge 

• Some airlines realize their hub airports are oversaturated, the air traffic control system is oversaturated, and the only way to grow is to strategically add a hub to their network ... Next, we’ll see the FAA modernize the air traffic system and I do believe it will be demonstrably better – Henry Harteveldt, president of Atmosphere Research Group, a travel industry analytics firm 

• I continue to be very disappointed by the efforts if you want to call them that, and the amount of money being spent by FAA on a so-called brand-new air traffic control system ... You’re going to get next year or five years from now, with that brand new system, what you have today – Robert W. Mann Jr., a former airline executive officer and current president of R.W. Mann and Co., an independent airline consultancy 

The premium push and the future of ultra-low cost carriers 

With Spirit Airlines gone, many other carriers continue to double down on their efforts to capture premium traffic. I’m still skeptical that this won’t backfire in the next market downturn, and the experts I’ve spoken to are mixed. One thing everyone agrees on, though, is that airfare is likely to keep getting more expensive. 

• We lost one-third of the nation’s ultra-low-cost carriers in a month ... With the problems that many people have with the ULCCs, whether it’s tight seats, reliability, whatever, we all know you benefit from their presence – William J. McGee, senior fellow for aviation and travel at theAmerican Economic Liberties Project 

• [Airlines are] finding people that are willing to pay for a more premium experience. That doesn’t necessarily mean flat beds for everyone, of course, that could mean extra legroom ... What happens in the next downturn? Who’s to say, but that’s an issue in any downturn. You don’t think, ‘wow I wish I had a bunch more cheap seats onboard. You may have to operate at a loss with fewer seats, but just having more seats is not likely to solve your problem – Snyder 

Climate change and sustainability 

Flying is a carbon-intensive activity, and despite bold promises from the industry, it will be tough to really change the way planes are powered. Meanwhile, turbulence is getting more frequent and severe, which is impacting flights in a variety of ways. 

• I really think the turbulence factor is going to change flying ... There’s going to be a shift in the service levels. Things are going to start getting dialed back to save money and cope with the amount of turbulence we’re experiencing – Rich Henderson, flight attendant and coauthor of the "Two Guys on a Plane" blog 

• The whole (sustainable aviation fuel) argument was just, it was an impossibility unless every single government around the world was going to subsidize its production and mandate its use ... You’ll probably see it fade into the footnotes – Mann  

Other odds and ends 

Some of the other topics these experts pointed out are the rise in electric air taxis that seems to be on the horizon, new ways of booking tickets that are more tailored to individual travelers, the likelihood of further consolidation in the industry and more. 

Predicting the future is never easy, and certainly not truly possible to do in a single column, but as I move once again toward being a regular traveler, I’m excited for the possibilities on the horizon. 

Thank you to everyone who read or contributed to this column over the years, who reached out to me with story ideas or tips, or complimented my terrible artwork. I’m going to miss it all enormously.  

Zach Wichter is a travel reporter and wrote the Cruising Altitude column for USA TODAY. He is based in New York and you can reach him at [email protected].