172driver wrote:
This dual language mandate is about the dumbest thing you can come up with. Not only deprives it the non-XXX (insert your favorite lingo here) pilots from SA, but it’s also really hard on the ATCO. In a former life I worked as translator and interpreter and after a day of interpreting your brain is fried. I am still used to switching between several languages on a daily basis (three so far today) but would absolutely not, I say again NOT, want to do the work of ATC like that.
I agree that it can be confusing. I myself have previously switched from English to German mid-sentence during R/T, and got (rightfully) told off for it by ATC (“please decide which language you want to use”).
On the other hand, if an inexperienced pilot needs to make a request / report something and they simply cannot get their brain to put together the English (=foreign) phrase for the moment, I would regard it as beneficial for safety if they can then revert to their native tongue instead.
On a day like today where most Europe is VFR (obviously a weekday 
), it is interesting to look for a GA activity map.
This is just adsbexchange filtered below 6000 feet. Off course all traffic is not shown but is it relevant as a ‘heat map’ ?
The most active regions are :
- southern UK
- a large area from northern germany to switzerland
- Northern Italy
Then we have :
- Eastern Austria
- Eastern Germany/Czech republic and Poland to a lesser extent
In France, Spain, Italy except the north, traffic is focused around the biggest cities (Paris, Toulouse, Lyon, Rome, Barcelona, Madrid).
Does it correspond to your observations ?
Germany is clearly a “well distributed GA” country 
The busiest GA day in UK south-east flying was Nov 4th 2020 (one day before UK lockdown), maybe once in 10 years, the weather was super nice: people did run out of options trying to rent a club aircraft, syndicates had to fight for the keys….I never seen such busy day, I spotted about +20 traffic while flying a small 80nm leg (50nm was in Class D), flying felt like gliding gaggle with propellers and I felt sorry for one guy at the taxiway/runway holding point very late on the day when number 6 called late downwind in the circuit !
I think it was a busy day for London FIS but I did not dial the frequency, just not worth it
Glad no MAC that day !
Germany is clearly a “well distributed GA” country
Maybe the Netherlands but Germany not so much. You can clearly see a divide between eastern and western Germany (although I wonder about the dense traffic at the Polish and Czech borders). Apparently the socialist leaders did not want their people to have flying as a hobby, so not so many airfields in the east except for the ex military ones.
Clipperstorch wrote:
You can clearly see a divide between eastern and western Germany (although I wonder about the dense traffic at the Polish and Czech borders)
One should not disregard where this data comes from. It does not show the actual VFR traffic but it does show only that part of the traffic that is in range of an adsb ground station operated by a hobbyist that is sharing data with adsb-exchange. In some regions there are simply few of such people – independent of the actual air traffic.
I thought about your point Malibu but the detection level is lower than you might think. Were you see a plane, a dozen would be seen if they were there.
What plays a role is the mix of Mode C/Mode S/ ADS-B. Maybe Spain is mostly Mode C while Benelux is 99% Mode S. France is about 50/50 I would say.
This may be worth a read.
In certain countries, most of GA is “below the radar” so non-txp, or Mode C if a txp is required for some airspace. But not Mode S, for all sorts of reasons. This isn’t widely discussed, and is not unrelated to the almost total collapse of certified GA in some places and a move to UL. Also much of the foreign reg Annex 1 population is flying non-txp or Mode C.
But UK is highly “transponding”
Well, it varies with altitude. Having been flying with the TAS605 for 8 years, I’d say most >3000ft traffic is Mode C or Mode S, and the non txp crowd being mostly below 2000ft. Anecdotal, of course, but it is very hard to miss. And, like with which planes are not appearing on google (hangar queens) ones not appearing on FR24 (not using Mode S) is generally significant.
I’m sure this map doesn’t show all VFR traffic. For example there is a huge FTO in LEAX outside Malaga and I know they’re flying, yet nothing shows up on the map. I think it’s as @Malibuflyer suggests – the density of the amateurs who have receivers and share the data varies widely from region to region.
