One of the fundamental purposes of the FAA is to encourage and develop civil aeronautics. No European Aviation Authority contains a simuilar statement within its charter therefore; they have no reason to promote or encourage aviation. Governments have not asked then to fulfill that function!
That is an astonishing result and one does wonder how much of the decades-old ICAO rulebook can be overturned in this way.
There is even more to this ruling than I first thought. I was told this ruling now applies to every country in the European Union. This is because in the decision this court has taken national law has been tested for conformanance with the treaties and laws of the European Union. According to the Rome treaty this ruling therefore now applies to every country in the European Union.
Furthermore it is no longer necessary to file a flight plan when flying VFR from one uncontrolled field to another uncontrolled field in a different Schengen country.
I'm no lawyer so I hope this makes sense... I also can't guarantee you won't get into trouble if you don't file a flightplan. :-)
There is even more to this ruling than I first thought. I was told this ruling now applies to every country in the European Union. This is because in the decision this court has taken national law has been tested for conformanance with the treaties and laws of the European Union. According to the Rome treaty this ruling therefore now applies to every country in the European Union.
I don't think so. First of all, it was about Annex II aircraft which are not covered by EU legislation. Secondly, a court in Holland does not have jurisdiction over any other country (the Hague tribunal aside) -- most likely not even about anything but this specific case. If the court ruled on the basis of European law, then it could only have an effect as judges dealing with similar cases in other countries might read the verdict and get some inspirations.
When a national court rules on basis of European law and it considers the legal question to be of general interest or it knows that other courts have a different point of view, then it would typically defer it to the European Court of Justice in Luxemburg. The ECJ's verdict is binding in all member countries. The ECJ is known to have very little tolerance in cases where freedom of exchange of people and goods is restricted.
kwlf:
Personally I don't buy the idea that envy has a lot to do with it - it doesn't seem to stop people in the UK from owning yachts, flashy cars or nice watches.
Envy has everything to do with it, particularly in Europe. Envy is instrumentalized on a big scale in European politics these days, particularly in those countries where socialist groups and governments have the say. In the UK flying may still be more accepted than in other places, yet particularly in the German speaking parts of Europe flying is considered to be a privilege for the very rich. And those are under massive attack from all sides.
As Steve 6443 sais, Germany is one of the countries where GA would be banned hands down or at least restricted to possibly gliders and UL's if the government could get away with it.
How come HE can do that and I can't???
Exactly Steve. And it doesn't occurr to them that they could very well do it if they took their fingers out of their collective ****** and got on with it, instead they pest and infest forums saying that aircraft ownership is by all means totally unaffordable for the "general population". And if someone pops up in one of these forums they will rant and rave and tell him to stop thinking about it and scare the living daylights out of prospective buyers.
Had an interesting one recently, where I was trying to help a mate of mine with a purchase. He was unfortunately not too quiet about it and let it slip at work that he was planning to buy a plane. The reaction was mind boggling! Some "helpful" folks called his wife and told horror stories about how much this cost, told her that live insurances don't cover death by light plane. One guy told him directly that he hoped he'd crash on the first flight. And his boss went as far as to tell him that his hobby had a bad effect on company morale and practically told him to forget his plans or seek other employ. THAT is what I am talking about. Envy driven morons who will haze, mob, ruin what ever they can. Needless to say, this guy not only shelved his plans but on top had to give up flying on pressure by his wife now... despite the fact that he could prove to her that all the allegations were wrong.
THAT is why most of us European pilots are looking longingly over the Atlantic ocean. And many of us are concerned that with what's going on there the US may well go down the same drainhole that Europe has. There are certainly enough socialist powers in the US who would love to see the US become a socialist hellhole like most European countries.
The reaction was mind boggling! Some "helpful" folks called his wife and told horror stories about how much this cost, told her that live insurances don't cover death by light plane. One guy told him directly that he hoped he'd crash on the first flight. And his boss went as far as to tell him that his hobby had a bad effect on company morale and practically told him to forget his plans or seek other employ.
The alternative is to keep quiet and enjoy your hobby in the company of other like minded people 
The other tip which I can vouch for personally is to choose a woman/man (whatever turns you on) who accepts your interests and hobbies.
And I mean this only partly tongue in cheek
In the bad old days, before internet dating, most people met their partner at work, or perhaps in some social activity. These are very difficult (for a man, especially) because unless you have the looks of G Clooney and work as a swimming pool attendant, you will have to dig deep to find somebody half reasonable. Even in a firm of hundreds of people, only a few might be in the right age group, available, etc and most of those will be pursued by many others. This is even more true in a social activity which most people (men especially) regard as primarily something to do for "fishing".
So most people end up with a partner who is "just OK" but shares very few of their interests. Men in particular are dreadful in choosing women, and don't seem to begin to get it right until sometime past 40 and with a divorce or two (and an appropriately depleted bank account) in the bag...
Consequently, loads of private pilots have wives who really dislike their hobby. I've seen a number forced to give up under "wife pressure".
Some stories are a bit tragic. I was not allowed (by ex) to take my boys up unless there was another pilot. So I used to (mostly) pay someone to come along. On a foreign trip this would cost hundreds (food, hotel room) extra. She didn't care if the other pilot sat in the back! It took 7 years for her to climb down. But I had it easy, relative to some people I know personally.
Unfortunately there isn't much one can do about this after the event...
Haha, I had a friend who owned a reasonable sized company. All his staff knew that he owned a C 150, and thought little of it (hey, no laughing out there!). However, when he bought a Ferrari 308GT for fun, he swore me to secrecy from his staff. I'm betting he never told his staff about the Bell 206 he later bought either - business was good!
After meeting and flying with a number of pilots of vastly varying skills in my earlier days of flying, I was not envious of their fancy planes, but for those who had it, their amazing experience. Many people can apply themselves and buy the expensive thing, but what is enviable is the person who operates it really well.
So, apparently, as I read, some airports on the right side of the Atlantic charge landing fees per landing to discourage practice! Duh!
Maybe it's getting time to arrange General Aviation tourism in Canada, the way we apparently do with snowmobiling....
Peter,
agree re the matchmaking techniques of today and I suppose both of us can be very happy with our respective current situations :) However, "wife pressure" is not something limited to aviation, I see these things happening in all sorts of hobbies or even the daily pint at the pub. True, today's dating possibilities are quite different, yet they also have their ups and downs. It's far easier today for both sexes to do a "catch me if you can" act online and again it's far easier to be caught too. And what has not changed one bit is that there are many potential spouses who wish to primarily land themselfs a relationship and "worry about changing it once it's secure".
What bugged me in that event was that this guys co-workers would not shy away from potentially ruining this guy's marriage by really heavily pesting the woman until she got so annoyed and scared with it that she put her foot down to end it, permanently. I actually tried to find out what happened since, and undestand that he is back flying but has left the company he worked for. No blame there.
Personally, I think that peer pressure generated out of envy and outright hostility is the much bigger problem. Where I work, there are some people who own Winnebagos and all of them own pretty nice cars, including 2 sports cars. I on the other hand own my airplane. Guess which is the cheapest to keep and buy.... I initially faced a lot of hostility (and it's difficult to hide the fact that you are flying your own plane when a) the change of ownership is advertized in a magazine they all read and b) they all work on the same airport one flies from and see me taxiing past every time I go flying :) I recently had a lunch talk about hobbies with some of them and got them to talk money (which is difficult in Switzerland). What I assumed proved to be true, my hobby is by far the cheapest, both in terms of purchase and upkeep. I had no idea however that a Winnebago type camper has the equivalent value to a used King Air... I did point them to planecheck and it opened some eyes.
So the problem is perception. I was often enough confronted by folks who thought my 1965 Mooney cost more to buy than a 5 bedroom house... which of course is totally wrong. I think that it would be very helpful if GA organisations would try to get people to understand that flying is by no means a perogative of only the super rich. Particularly since EASA seems to think so too and therefore think that cost doesn't matter to those rich stinkers they'd like to get rid of.
One of the ironies of any of the so called "pastimes for the rich" is that the vast majority of the genuinely active participants are generally skint (or at the very least, not rich). Horses, boats, motor racing, skiing, flying etc etc. I know many people involved in at least one, and all of them have very average means, but they just make choices and prioritise. They drive Tesco value cars and live in houses in which they never get around to refitting the bathroom/kitchen.
The other irony is that most of the people who have the envy spend more on their "normal" austere existence - £30-40k brand new car every years with a few fancy holidays per year along with the general habit of buying stuff they don't need.
GA in the USA is stuck in the mud. No new designs (except Cirrus) in the past ten years for example. Europe has all the innovators….Flight Design, Diamond, Pipistrel, Tecnam to name a few. The FAA is stifling to GA. Just look how well the EASA is doing compared to the FAA for getting changes done…
I note with interest on the BBC website a report about the misery of travelling commercial in the US here
I think there is a lot of truth in the report – which leads to greater utility value of GA in the US
My other point is that private flying is expensive. GDP per capita in the US is about $55k compared with about $30k in the Eurozone. I’m sure this has an impact. Pure speculation, but this might also be a valuable source of energy to drive the innovation mentioned by USFlyer above?
