By Chris Sasser
Texas A&M Transportation Institute
A near record crowd of 548 attendees were treated to a stellar lineup of speakers and sessions at the 41st Texas Aviation Conference at Moody Gardens in Galveston, Texas. The event was hosted by the Texas Department of Transportation’s (TxDOT) Aviation Division, and participants included aviation professionals, exhibitors, and enthusiasts.
This year’s conference was highlighted by a question-and-answer session from U.S. Representative Sam Graves, who serves as the Chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure (T&I) Committee. The Committee has jurisdiction over all modes of transportation – the aviation system, highways and bridges, transit and rail transportation, pipelines, and maritime and waterborne transportation.
U.S. Representative Sam Graves, Chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and TxDOT Executive Director Marc Williams.
The conference began with the traditional presentation of colors by the Galveston Fire Department, followed by the National Anthem, which was sung by Amy Larison. Then Brian Maxwell, Galveston City Manager, welcomed attendees to Galveston followed by remarks from TxDOT Executive Director Marc Williams.
“This is fantastic to see this great crowd and level of participation,” said Williams. “This is one of the best conferences TxDOT puts on year in and year out. It’s really because of the passion, enthusiasm, and collaboration that the participants bring.”
TxDOT Director Dan Harmon then gave his annual state of the Aviation Division Address.
Harmon began his comments by inviting everyone to visit their new headquarters facility located at 6230 E. Stassney Lane. The Aviation Division moved into the new facility in the past year after residing in the Riverside Office Campus for over 20 years. Harmon then introduced new staff members who joined the division in the past year.
Harmon then spoke about the new Texas Airport System Plan.
“We recently kicked off the Texas Airport System Plan update project,” said Harmon. “We’re taking a bit of a different approach this time around in that this will be a living document that we can continuously update and use as the basis for statewide airport development. Not only will it help populate our new databases coming online for airport access management and project development, but we’ll also look at new technologies. The result will be a better process for project identification selection.”
Then Harmon announced a new hangar rehabilitation project at their Flight Services facility located at Bergstrom Airport. Harmon noted that the facility offers flight services for state officials and maintenance for state agency aircraft. The project, when completed, will double its maintenance capacity and footprint.
Harmon then discussed the TxDOT Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) program, which is designed to be flexible while ensuring that all UAS activities conducted on behalf of TxDOT are done in the safest manner possible in compliance with all statutory requirements.
Following Harmon’s remarks was “A Conversation with Chairman Graves.” TxDOT Executive Director Williams moderated the session. Graves began the session by explaining the role of the House T&I Committee.
“We are the largest committee in Congress with 65 members,” said Graves. “We have jurisdiction over all modes of transportation including waterways, shipping, ports, aviation, highways, bridges; anything or any way it can move, we have jurisdiction. In addition to that, we have jurisdiction over all public buildings in the United States, such as a Federal Courthouse or the Smithsonian, and the U.S. Coast Guard. It’s a big committee with a lot of jurisdictions and a lot of history in Congress.”
Williams also noted that Graves is co-chair of the House General Aviation Caucus. The purpose of a congressional caucus is to inform Members of Congress and their staffs about the importance of general aviation to the economy and transportation system.
The conversation then shifted to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Reauthorization.
“I’m looking forward to passing a bipartisan FAA reauthorization this year that will include the first ever general aviation title,” said Graves. “So many who pursue a career in aviation start out as a GA pilot, starting out at their local airfield. But there are challenges to that, such as expense, and we have to make sure that we figure out how to break down barriers to get young people involved and excited in aviation again. It’s incumbent upon us in general aviation to do everything we can to encourage young people to choose a career in aviation, and that’s something we need to be thinking about in terms of this reauthorization bill.”
After a break, NASAO President & CEO Greg Pecoraro participated in a roundtable discussion with Texas Aviation Advisory Committee Chairman Shelly deZevallos. Pecoraro provided an overview of recent NASAO activities.
Keynote speaker Texas State Demographer Dr. Lloyd Potter completed the morning session. The Texas Demographic Center functions as a focal point for the production, interpretation, and distribution of demographic information for Texas. In his presentation, Dr. Potter explained the recent population trends in Texas and what it means for our future.
After lunch, AVN Director of Planning and Programming Jim Halley moderated a Texas Airport System Plan Update. Then the conference began the afternoon breakout sessions.
“This year, we had so many session topics that we wanted to offer to our participants, that we elected to have four concurrent breakout sessions versus three,” said Halley.
Among the topics covered were aviation education, airport construction, non-primary entitlement program, emerging technologies, and the popular RAMP session. Fernando Hernandez recently became the RAMP Coordinator.
The day concluded with the annual banquet, which featured the TxDOT Awards Program winners.
The final morning of the conference featured three morning sessions.
The Airport Compliance session was moderated by Jim Halley, and then the popular Aviation Section Directors Townhall featured a townhall-style session with the Aviation section directors.
The conference concluded with an FAA Update and Q and A. This session provided participants the opportunity to ask questions to FAA officials and provide feedback on important issues.
“Every year we work hard to provide a wide range of relevant session topics for our participants,” said Harmon. “I was very pleased with our high attendance this year and we will review our evaluations carefully to improve our conference even more next year.”