Airports

Lights in tunnel under Van Nuys Airport put spotlight on graffiti -- To drivers along Sherman Way, the tunnel that burrows beneath Van Nuys Airport has long been a backdrop for ever-changing graffiti. But as Los Angeles prepares to brighten up the dim Sherman Way tunnel this summer with a $1.2 million string of new LED lights, some worry they will only highlight blight for a new wave of international jet-setters. Dana Bartholomew/Los Angeles Daily News

Twitter posts about TSA mostly negative, study finds -- If you read any online Twitter posts that mention the Transportation Security Administration, most of the comments are going to be negative for nearly every airport in the country. Except for one: Bob Hope Airport in Burbank. Travelmath, an online trip calculator, evaluated 7,377 Twitter posts that mention the TSA during the first four months of the year. Based on the terms used in those tweets, Travelmath determined whether the posts were positive, negative or neutral. Hugo Martin/Los Angeles Times

Bob Hope Airport's connection to high-speed railway is still in the air -- If the state's bullet train is going to have a station near Bob Hope Airport, the two transportation facilities should connect, airport Executive Director Dan Feger said this week. However, first things first - the airport and the city need to hash out the details of a proposed 14-gate replacement terminal at the airfield, he added. That was the position Feger outlined during a presentation to the Burbank City Council on Tuesday. Chad Garland/Burbank Leader

Faulty food warmer forces jetliner to return to land at LAX -- A jetliner that took off from Los Angeles International Airport Sunday afternoon returned and landed safely after a faulty food warmer in the plane's galley sent an odor and smoke into the cabin. LAN Airlines flight 601 had departed LAX bound for Lima, Peru at 2:05 p.m. with 230 passengers and 17 crewmembers aboard and turned back toward the airport about an hour later, LAX spokeswoman Nancy Castles said. The Boeing 787 Dreamliner landed safely shortly before 4 p.m. City News Service

Ethiopian Airlines starts flights to Dublin and Los Angeles -- Ethiopian Airlines, the largest airline in Africa, is pleased to announce that it has started flights to Dublin and Los Angeles on 19 June 2015. Ethiopian flights to Dublin and Los Angeles are operated three times a week with the ultramodern Boeing 787 Dreamliner, which offers unparalleled on-board comfort to passengers. The flights are the only direct service connecting Africa with Ireland and the West Coast of the United States. Ethiopian Airlines Press Release

Celebrity Shoe Style: LAX International Airport -- If there is one thing all celebrities have in common, it's traveling. Every day, Los Angeles International Airport is swamped with departures and arrivals, with paparazzi waiting to get the best shot of a celeb coming into or leaving L.A. And with summer on the way, travel season is shifting into high gear. LAX has seen Kim Kardashian, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, Kit Harrington, Chrissy Teigen and many more pass through its gates this month. Nikara Johns/Footwear News

New airline scheduled to fly into Gateway: Current carrier says it may move out -- Mesa Mayor John Giles couldn't be more clear about his desire for commercial air service at Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport. So, the mayor was split in his feelings Wednesday when talking about plans for a second carrier to begin flying there and perplexed by the possibility of the current carrier moving its base to Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. Shelley Ridenour/East Valley Tribune

2024 Olympics

Los Angeles may have a shot at the 2024 Olympics after all -- Alan Abrahamson, the Los Angeles journalist who covers Olympics politics and sports at his 3WireSports website, has an interesting new post up. He reports that the U.S. Olympic Committee is pondering - and he opines that they should do it - the removal of Boston as the U.S. candidate to win the 2024 summer games. Apparently things are not going well with the Boston candidacy. It's unpopular in the city and there are other issues. Kevin Roderick/LA Observed

Massport CEO: Logan Airport will be ready if the Olympics come to Boston - As Olympics organizers weigh venues, financing and transportation options, they've also had to work through the reality of whether Logan Airport can handle the massive influx of passengers who would travel in and out of Boston to attend the Games. Massport CEO Thomas Glynn has met at least twice with both Boston 2024 organizers and with officials from the United States Olympic Committee as the Boston bid was in development to discuss whether Logan is up to the challenge of an Olympics-sized event, he told the BBJ in an interview. Mary Moore/Boston Business Journal

Airlines

Delta's unorthodox fix-it man is feuding with rivals once again -- In the past few years, Delta Air Lines' CEO offended some Middle Easterners with a reference to Sept. 11, pitted the carrier against Boeing in a trade issue and upset conservatives at home in Georgia. Is this any way to run an airline? It is for Richard Anderson, who in almost eight years as chief executive officer has taken Delta from bankruptcy to record profits and soaring customer-satisfaction rankings. Michael Sasso/Bloomberg

Airline stocks could soar up to 50% -- The U.S. airline industry has a history of panicking at the first sight of profits. Since deregulation in 1978, favorable conditions have often tempted carriers to add planes and seats too quickly, leading to price wars and losses. So investors are right to question whether the industry ought to throttle back from a likely 3% to 3.5% capacity increase this year to a more cautious pace next year. Even so, recent selling in airline shares looks overdone. Jack Hough/Barron's

Study: Gulf airlines a boon to U.S. economy and U.S. airlines, too -- Freezing Open Skies agreements would cost billions of dollars in economic activity and tax revenue, and tens of thousands of jobs, according to research commissioned by the U.S. Travel Association. The Oxford Economics study was commissioned in reaction to a request this year from the three largest U.S. network airlines - American, Delta and United - for the Obama administration to review Open Skies agreements with airlines from the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. Johanna Jainchill/Travel Weekly

Airlines put pilots in a real spin in new training initiative -- The latest trend in training pilots to fly commercial jets features the practicing of extreme maneuvers in small, propeller-powered aircraft. Using a technique unheard of until recently, carriers such as Delta Air Lines Inc. and South African Airways are sending some of their most experienced flight instructors back to flight school to learn how to recognize and recover from airborne upsets. Andy Pasztor/Wall Street Journal

United Airlines flight diverts to Belfast, passengers sleep on floor -- Almost 300 United Airlines passengers slept on an airport floor overnight after their flight from Rome to Chicago was diverted to offload a disruptive passenger late Saturday. Their ordeal began when Flight UA971 made an unscheduled landing in Belfast, Northern Ireland, where a passenger was arrested. The Boeing 777 landed at 6.59 p.m. local time (1.59 p.m. ET) Saturday and was refueled but flight crew reached FAA working hour limits before the journey could resume. Alastair Jamieson/NBC News

United Airlines' Israel flights plagued by disruptions -- A number of United Airlines flights to and from Israel have been plagued by disruptions and cancellations over the past month, passengers have reported. The airline, which serves Ben-Gurion International Airport from its Newark hub in the New York area, said in the response that it apologizes for any inconvenience caused to members of the public and is taking steps to improve adherence to its flight schedule. Zohar Blumenkrantz/Haaretz

Airline web services near a big upgrade -- Passengers have been unexpectedly slow to embrace onboard Internet, but aerospace executives at the Paris international air show that ended here Sunday painted a futuristic picture of planes entirely connected to the Web from nose to tail. For the past few years, proponents of the so-called connected airline have said the industry was on the cusp of a breakthrough. Now, for various technical and economic reasons, experts say those predictions are beginning to be borne out. Andy Pasztor & Rory Jones/Wall Street Journal

Airline executive's former castle in Eagan is now a family home -- A man's home is his castle, according to the old English proverb. But James Wagley and Deb Newell's home really is a castle - or at least a 20th-century facsimile of one - reigning over a wooded hilltop in the kingdom of Eagan. The man with the vision was former Northwest Airlines CEO Steve Rothmeier, who built the house for himself in 1985, on acreage a few miles from the airline's corporate headquarters. (Rothmeier, who died last year, was still the owner when Wagley and Newell bought the house.) Kim Palmer/Star Tribune

Private jets take off for business travelers -- Nabbing a seat on a private jet is becoming as easy as ordering a movie from Netflix. A number of companies are trying to be the Uber of private planes by letting fliers book a flight with the tap of an app. "Instead of putting unused cars on the road or filling unused beds, we're����� putting sleek King Air 350s in the air," says Nick Kennedy, founder and CEO of Rise, a fly-all-you-want membership air travel company. "And we're filling them with business travelers who would otherwise be stuck in long lines at a commercial airport." Nancy Trejos/USA Today

Aviation at the Movies

Las Vegas aviation company specializes in mangling planes for Hollywood -- In the trailer for the new "Terminator" movie, Arnold Schwarzenegger says "Ah'll be back," then launches himself from one helicopter into another like a human missile. This explosive action sequence wouldn't have been possible without a strong supporting performance by a little-known character actor from Las Vegas. The helicopter that gets terminated in the scene was provided by Scroggins Aviation Mockup &Effects, a small, valley-based company making a big splash in Hollywood. Henry Brean/Las Vegas Review-Journal

Aviation Photography

"Lunartics," on how to shoot the moon -- If you've ever spent time staring at the moon, you may have seen a plane appear to cross it. The art of capturing that moment has become an addiction for a group of southern California photographers, who meet up to shoot the breeze, and the moon. As CBS News correspondent David Begnaud found out, timing is everything. The misery of missing the moment is short lived, another chance is about to fly by. On a near-full moon night in southern California, a group of photographers tried repeatedly to snap the money-shot of an airliner crossing the moon. CBS News

Drones

This senator wants to clamp down on the drone you got for Christmas -- A top Democrat is proposing to give the Federal Aviation Administration new powers to police consumer drones just like the agency plans to regulate commercial ones. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.) introduced the Consumer Drone Safety Act on Thursday in a bid to head off some of the near-collisions that have plagued airports and manned aircraft around the country. The bill would instruct the FAA to impose altitude restrictions on private drones, as well as limitations on where and when they can fly. Brian Fung/Washington Post

Aviation Data & Analysis

US Value Carriers Drive May Traffic Growth
Courtesy Oliver Wyman PlaneStats
City Government

Los Angeles ordinance could provide amnesty for unpermitted billboards -- Hundreds of billboards in Los Angeles that have missing or incorrect permits could be shielded from enforcement under a new law proposed by city officials. Nearly 1,000 billboards across the city either lack permits or aren't in compliance with their existing permits, according to a Department of Building and Safety database released last December. The city hasn't cracked down on those signs as the Los Angeles City Council debates a new sign ordinance. Dakota Smith/Los Angeles Daily News

Seeking balance, L.A. council members may soften homeless ordinances -- After years of restraint, the Los Angeles City Council is embracing aggressive tactics against homeless encampments, setting the stage for sweeps aimed at eliminating tent cities and makeshift shelters. But amid widespread criticism that they have gone too far, some council members are talking about softening two ordinances that give authorities wide latitude in confiscating and destroying homeless people's property. Gale Holland/Los Angeles Times

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