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Uber's Short-lived Helicopter Service In Utah Grounded (ksl.com)
New submitter captaindomon writes: It may come as no surprise that the Uber helicopter flights which debuted at the Sundance Film Festival were apparently illegal and quickly grounded. "Thanks to the support and partnership we have with Sundance and Park City Municipal Corporation, we were able to come to an agreement," said Summit County spokeswoman Katie Mullaly. "We are glad to have this issue resolved, not only for the safety of all those involved, but also for the wildlife of the area, affected residents and environmental concerns."
At least it wasn't 3D-printed drones.
At least they where not shot down / in lockup. For going into an no fly zone?.
The issue was the landing site wasn't properly approved for helicopter landings. Fortunately, the local officials are reasonable and Uber made an agreement with the County to use the Sheriff's landing pad instead so that flights could continue during the festival.
From a follow-up story: "Thanks to the county's proactive outreach, we have developed an alternative landing site for uberCHOPPER that serves riders and accommodates residents," Patterson said.
The party of stupid and the party of evil get together and do something both stupid and evil, then call it bipartisan.
If a property owner wants to allow helicopters to land on their property, why is the government denying them permission? If the FAA allows the flight, how can the county or the city deny the landings?
Personally, I think the operators doing this should be allowed to continue unless there is some EPA or FAA objection. Local, County and State law should NOT be allowed to prohibit this activity unless they can prove they have standing on public safety grounds. I don't think they have shown that yet.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
In my city,
there used to be a sign at the public beach that said something (in red circle with bar through) like "No fires"
Nowadays, the sign says
"No fires"
"No dogs off leash"
"No Vehicles"
"No smoking"
and about 4 other things I can't remember, probably including "No frisbees"
It would be much more efficient if they just put up a sign which says along the lines of:
"Whatever we haven't explicitly permitted you to do is forbidden, obviously!"
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
What is wrong? Why is it illegal?
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
...that Sarah Palin won't be shootin' his momma out the side of her rented helicopter.
it isn't as if uber has invented some new technology.
it's business is to break regulations and squeeze out profits by not incurring the costs others pay in following laws.
this is no different from lawyers/accountants of big corps finding loopholes/book cooking methods to not pay taxes, etc etc,
by all means campaign to reduce rules,regulations, and taxes(most are harmful), but presenting rule breaking as praiseworthy innovation is not the way to go about it .
My first gut reaction was to agree with you. But then I realized that means anyone can build an airport (or after-hours nightclub) in the middle of any subdivision, there would be no zoning laws allowed. I'm not sure if that's a great idea or not.
I kind of like the current situation in Texas - cities have zoning, counties pretty much don't. So outside the city limits you can do what you want, within the city you have to be more mindful of how your actions effect neighbors next door. That lets you choose - do you want (enforced) peace and quiet, or do you want to be able to target practice in your back yard? You can either.
Money.
Actually you're frothing at the mouth in your hatred and it's none too appealing, sir.
Try to keep a civil tongue in your head and go back to high school.
And sorry your taxi medallion isn't worth more than your chest hair.
Uber and Lyft are great (this stupid "Uber chopper" thing notwithstanding)
People who hate Uber and can't articulate without frothing at the mouth aren't great at all.
Best regards, and go off yourself to feel better.
E
You make a compelling argument, but you happen to be mistaken. See sections 113 and 114 in this FAA advisory. State and local governments can regulate helipads, via zoning or otherwise.
http://www.faa.gov/documentlib...
The FCC is more like what you imagine the FAA to be. Specifically, as noted in that FAA advisory, the FAA is legally charged with the SAFETY of air travel only. This is in contrast to the FCC, which has wide authority over anything related to radio spectrum. The ATF is somewhat the opposite- you have to certify your explosives storage complies with local and state law BEFORE they'll start the federal process.
It would have to be via an aircraft (helicopter or fixed wing) licensed to a company with a valid and current commercial passenger-carrying license. Which is to say it would be expensive.
It's not illegal under FAA regulations to accept money for a ride on a private aircraft, but the amount can be no more than the actual cost incurred, divided by the passengers carried.
Since a pilot of a private aircraft is considered a passenger, that means (for example) in a flight consisting of a pilot and a passenger, the passenger can legally pay, at most, ½ of the actual verified cost of the flight, and no more. The fact that it's a helicopter and not fixed wing is irrelevant as the same rules apply.
The FAA regulates flying (aircraft, pilots, airspace, etc.) but state government's regulate their land. The state is the authority on property zoning laws. They can't prevent you from flying over their land, but they can certainly prevent you from landing on it. They can regulate whether you can have an airport, grass landing strip, place to land a helicopter, etc. For another example, some states will fine you if you make an emergency landing on a road (and they will confiscate your aircraft). The FAA only gets involved in the land issues as it regards the construction and operation of airports/helipads. The state can most certainly tell you that you can't land a helicopter on your private land. (Which tells you something about how private your "private property" really is, if you weren't clear on the concept.)
Well the issue was actually really simple. You can not just plow off a field in a residential neighborhood, and start running commercial flights into it every 15 minutes. It is the same rules that prevent you from opening an auto repairs shop, or a strip club, or a bar in a residential neighborhood. The only way they might have had a chance at that was to not charge at all, and even then they would be in violation of noise ordinances. You can't just do whatever you want in a residential neighborhood for very good reasons, such as keeping all of the neighbors from killing each other. You are allowed to operate a small home based business, with 2 or less employees, that does not take customer visits (i.e. a store front) in a residential neighborhood.
:-).
If Uber had applied for a permit, or even worked with the county, before pulling off this stunt, they probably would have been accomadated in a commercial zone. The sheriff's office considered allowing them to use their EMERGENCY helipad as a stop gap, but once they thought about it they realized that could interfere with their ability to respond to an actual emergency. I know, as I have worked with the sheriif's office and used that helipad. It is not designed for commercial flights every 15 minutes. The debris alone there can be hazardous on a chopper landing, and we would have to walk it before one came in.
On the first day they ran, they also violated the minimum altitude rules flying over my house on approach, as they used a loose approximation of AGL ignoring the mountain peaks. I had helicopters a few hundred feet off my roof ALL DAY long. You try working under those conditions.
The other story you don't hear about is the locals hate Sundance, myself included. It attracts the most pretentious, self righteous, jerks you have ever seen. I literally have had people push me out of line in the grocery store because 'They were late for their film'. Mistake to do to a local as we push back
Uber blew it. They didn't even try to work with the local government, nor the locals, to come up with a reasonable plan. The drive from SLC airport to Park City is only 35 minutes. It is actually quicker than taking the uber from the terminal, to the helipad, then wait for the helicopter, then land in a neighborhood, then drive in from there. They also could have landed at Heber airport, that is setup for private jets even, and is only 15 minutes away. They were selling an image to a bunch of pretentious wanna bes, and Uber got caught. Blade only joined in after the announcement by Uber.
The other thing they did not mention that I have not seen in the news is they originally planned to land within Park City limits. They knew the city would enforce every rule on them immediately, and were told so by the city government, so they moved just outside of city limits last minute. Generally, the county is more lenient, but obviously decided it was in their best interest to enforce the rules after that game. Uber got what they deserved, and should now actually be forced to pay a fine as they cost us tax payers a bunch of money for law enforcement and attorney fees.