United pilots choose motor homes in 'LAX Ghetto' after pay cuts

MarkE

MarkE

Greetings, Professor Falken
http://www.dailybreeze.com/ci_20704807/united-pilots-choose-motor-homes-lax-ghetto-after


Before taking off for a long-haul flight, United Airlines pilot Pat LaClair hunkers down for a good night's sleep in his 33-foot beige motor home, parked in a remote parking lot at Los Angeles International Airport.

Dozens of other airline employees often rest up at the so-called LAX Ghetto before tackling a long shift, but LaClair says he has no choice because he's not paid enough by United Airlines.

"If we were paid the industry standard rates, then a lot of the folks here could have other options," LaClair, a Phoenix resident, said outside his well-appointed motor home parked at LAX's Lot E.

"I moved here two years ago as an affordability issue," LaClair said. "I need a place to stay between trips, so I choose to live here rather than dole out hundreds of dollars every month for a hotel or an apartment."
LaClair and other members of the Air Line Pilots Association on Thursday invited reporters to the LAX Ghetto to demonstrate how a 42 percent pay cut over the past nine years has affected United Airlines pilots.

United's pilots have remained on an amended contract that went into effect in 2003 after the Chicago-based carrier filed for bankruptcy, but union officials said they want a new labor pact that pays "prevailing industry wages."

In the meantime, union officials said, United's executives continue to get pay raises and bonuses.
"We're tired of waiting," said Jon Dudley, who has worked as a United pilot for 15 years and serves as the Los Angeles strike chairman for the Air Line Pilots Association.

"It's been nine years that we've been living under a bankruptcy contract, we've negotiating to get out from under this for three years and our CEO has got the highest compensation of anyone in the airline industry," Dudley said. "They're reaping all the benefits while we do all the work."

United executives did not take up an invitation by union officials to visit the LAX Ghetto. And the carrier's press office did not return a phone call seeking comment.

LAX's Parking Lot E can accommodate up 100 motor homes belonging to employees from all the airlines passing through LAX, some of whom live there full-time. But referring to the humble abode as a "ghetto" is disingenuous, said Doug Rogers, a United mechanic.

Rogers was faced with a tough decision when United closed its maintenance plant in Salt Lake City just weeks after 9-11: he could stay in town and find another job, or move to an open position in Los Angeles.
He chose the latter, but couldn't afford Southern California's pricey rents. Instead, he opted to live in a motor home that's been parked at Lot E since October 2001.

"Most of the people here will tell you how grateful they are to have this privilege because you save money on rent," said Rogers, also known as the unofficial mayor of Lot E.

"I think the pilots have been shafted with cuts, but they need to be a little more careful about how they characterize this," Rogers said. "I've taken pay cuts too, you know."

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If stuff doesn't get better, and I mean a lot better. All you guys still getting your ratings and those now flying at the minor leagues, hell even even the majors after reading this article are crazy to stay in this profession. Just for the privilege to fly a plane!
 
There were several national stories about this in 2009 as well. Nothing has changed in three years has it? Oh wait, there have been more furloughs, bankruptcies and mergers.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106970003

http://articles.latimes.com/2009/jul/20/local/me-lax-colony20

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lax-lot_ss,0,2362810.htmlstory

Pilots, FAs, mechanics, all sort of personnel from several carriers have been living like this for several years.

Pilots are charged with the legal and moral responsibility of the safe carriage of their pax and yet have to live like boy scouts in a parking lot while the CEOs spend their days in lavish offices of which the furnishings alone, would pay for several senior Captains salaries while they play politics and games with their employee's lives and professions.

This is just a disgrace.

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Imported from China, silk covered furniture. Marbled topped tables, imported lamps, granite floor with imported silk rugs and a teak desk on which to draft the next screwing that the employees received. Meanwhile, many pilots are bringing lunch boxes to work.
 
If you catch me in an unguarded moment, I will confess that there was a time that I really wanted to go to the airlines. Didn't work out that way. In retrospect, a freaking miracle. Insofar as I'm capable of feeling, I really feel for you guys.
 
I thought about parking my RV there when I started doing reserve in SoCal a few years ago. It was too noisy for me so I just parked on the mean streets of El Segundo. Worked out great. Decided I needed something bigger and entered the SoCal real estate market...whooooops. Anyhow, I would bet that the folks "living" in the RV's are commuters who could either be based somewhere cheaper if they wanted or have a crash pad. I don't disagree with the premise that the industry isn't what it used to be. But to draw the conclusion that airline pilots have been "forced" into living in RV's isn't accurate, I think. The Hacienda is $65 out the door (or used to be). I mean, what if a guy chooses to live in a tent in the campground at the beach off the end of the runway? Then the LA times does a story that pilots are living in tents? I see it partly as sensationalist journalism.
 
DE727UPS said:
I see it partly as sensationalist journalism.
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It's not partly, it's the whole point. The union is using the media to put pressure on managemnt. Using the public's distaste of high living CEOs to garner public support before the inevitable summer meltdown.
 
I blame the media for poor journalistic skills more than the pilots who are trying to prove a point. If this were "real" journalism, they'd do some fact checking ie how much do these pilots make? How much are they spending on the primary residence (I thought AZ was cheap?), what other toys do these guys have etc......I mean, what's really the cost difference between the Hacienda/Crashpad vs one of these mobile homes?
 
This is an intellectually dishonest article. The writer obviously intends for the take away message to be that United pilots are so poorly paid that they they can't afford a home, and thus are "forced" to live in an RV. We all know that these people don't "live" there; that this is just an alternative to maintaining a crashpad. The very fact that these people own an RV is testament to the fact that the average airline pilot earns a lot more money than the average non-airline pilot.

I don't think that this is going to engender any meaningful public support. The only people who care about such things are the "class envious" who probably can't afford airline travel, or the Learjet and limosine liberals that don't fly commercial.
 
I seriously want to get into one of those RVs and drive it somewhere so when the people wake up they freak out.
 
While the first and current article talks only about United pilots, the article below, is from 3 years ago. (June, 2009 L.A. Times) There are crews and various mechanics from many carriers living like this. Interesting that pilots readily accept the fact that some pilots often sleep in crew lounges or have to sleep in crash pads, that many pilots fly long commutes, yet pooh pooh the notion of some pilots and other airline employees having to live in their RVs.



"For about 15 days a month, Alaska Airlines pilot Jim Lancaster lives in a motor home in Parking Lot B near the southernmost runway at Los Angeles International Airport.

Every four minutes, a jetliner or turboprop roars in -- 500 feet above his front door -- for a landing. The noise is so loud it forces Lancaster to pause during conversations. But he doesn't mind. Lancaster puts up with the smell of jet fuel and screaming engines to save time and money.

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The 60-year-old aviator's primary residence is a cottage he shares with his wife overlooking a quiet bay off Puget Sound in Washington state. Living in Lot B while he's on duty means he doesn't have to rent a Los Angeles apartment with other pilots or spend 12 hours a day commuting to and from the Seattle area.
"As kids we used to ask our parents to take us to the airport to see the planes," Lancaster quipped. "Now I get to live at the airport."

He isn't the only one. Lancaster's 2001 Tradewinds sits among 100 trailers and motor homes that form a colony of pilots, mechanics and other airline workers at LAX, the third-busiest airport in the nation. They are citizens of one of the most unusual communities in the United States.

Their turf, just east of the Proud Bird restaurant off Aviation Boulevard, is less than 3,500 feet from the south runway. It is a drab expanse of crumbling gray asphalt, approach lights, chain-link fencing and rows of beige and white RVs -- some battered, others grand. A splash of color comes from the red and white blooms of about a dozen rose bushes along the colony's northern edge.

Many of the residents are separated from spouses, children and significant others for days -- even weeks -- at a time in order to keep their jobs or move up the pyramid of the airline industry.

"This is the cost of being a pilot today," said Todd Swenson, 40, a first officer with Alaska Airlines. His wife, Amanda, and 2-year-old son, Noah, live in Fresno, a six-hour commute by car. "I've wanted to be a pilot all my life. It can be awful here. But I have to provide for my family, and I love flying airplanes."

Swenson, who earns about $70,000 a year, lives across from Lancaster in a 1973 Coachman trailer that belonged to his father. If Lancaster's 38-foot rig with leather furniture is Park Place, Swenson's is Mediterranean Avenue. The 23-foot metal box is as cramped as economy class, with just enough space for a double bed, a television and a La-Z-Boy recliner. There is a galley kitchen and a bathroom about the size of an airliner lavatory.

The trailer's windows are blacked out with foil and brown paper bags so Swenson can sleep during the day. To muffle the constant din of aircraft, he bought a white-noise machine -- a small tape player with a recording that sounds like a washing machine. Swenson works out at a nearby 24-Hour Fitness, where he showers to conserve his trailer's limited water supply.

Inside the Coachman, the wood paneling and storage cabinets are covered with photos of Amanda and Noah, whom Swenson returns to about 11 days a month. He keeps in touch via a computer webcam.
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"When my tires leave the driveway of my house in Fresno," Swenson said, "the only thing I can think about is getting back to my family."
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For several years, clusters of RVs were scattered around the airport's parking lots until LAX officials decided to consolidate them in Lot B. Now operating as an organized camp overseen by the airport, it has an unofficial mayor, a code of conduct and residency requirements, including background checks, regular vehicle inspections and proof of employment at an air carrier.

"There might be a few other places like this nationally, but I think this is rather unique," said Michael Biagi, who heads the land-use division at Los Angeles World Airports.

Today, the colony has more than 100 residents -- mostly men -- from around the country, including captains, first officers, mechanics, flight attendants, support staff and employees of air cargo companies. There are at least two married couples, who work as flight attendants. About 10 people are on a waiting list.

Lot B's attractiveness is partly the result of the decade-long decline in air travel brought about by the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the outbreak of SARS -- severe acute respiratory syndrome -- in 2003 and the deepest recession since World War II.

Salaries for pilots, mechanics and other airline workers have plummeted. Captains like Lancaster have been demoted to first officer, losing hard-earned seniority and forcing them out of plum assignments at airports close to home. Lancaster, who came to LAX from Seattle about 18 months ago, estimates that his reduction in rank cost him about $30,000 a year, roughly 20% of his pay.

Rather than quit their jobs or uproot their families for what could be a temporary stint in Los Angeles, workers have settled in Lot B, where the rent is only $60 a month.

"They'd probably be out of a job otherwise," said Doug Rogers, a 62-year-old United Airlines mechanic from Utah, who is the colony's acting mayor. "You can't maintain a household elsewhere and afford a home here in this economic climate. The airline industry is fragile right now. You just don't know what is going to happen."
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Rogers has lived at LAX for about seven years in a 26-foot camper built on a Ford truck chassis. He and his wife own a house in Stansbury Park, a semi-rural community of 2,500 just north of Salt Lake City.
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Rogers' living situation is the product of years of financial difficulties at United, which has gone in and out of bankruptcy proceedings. He lost his assignment at Salt Lake City International Airport, where United closed its maintenance facility a few months after the Sept. 11 attacks.

A $5 pay cut to $30 an hour, along with the airline's still tenuous future, led to his decision to keep his Stansbury Park house and rent a spot in Lot B, he said. He now works four 10-hour days a week and gets at least three days off to go back to Utah.

There's another advantage to not commuting -- whether by plane or car -- when on duty: Pilots and mechanics can get more rest, mitigating a problem that has plagued airline workers for decades.
An ongoing federal investigation indicates that fatigue could have been a factor in the crash of a Colgan Air turboprop that killed 50 people in Buffalo, N.Y., on Feb. 12. The pilot was commuting from Tampa, Fla., to Colgan's base in New Jersey. The copilot had regularly traveled from Seattle.

According to the National Transportation Safety Board, 93 of Colgan's 137 New Jersey-based pilots considered themselves commuters, including 49 who traveled more than 400 miles and 29 who lived more than 1,000 miles away.

If not for Lot B or other temporary quarters, the residents would be commuting from Anchorage, Seattle, Indianapolis, Memphis, Minneapolis and Hawaii. Others live in California, but hundreds of miles from LAX.

"We try to keep a real low profile," said Steve Young, 52, a United Airlines mechanic whose family lives in Twentynine Palms.

Most people pass their free time reading, watching movies, shopping for supplies or servicing their RVs. Occasionally, there are bike rides to Dockweiler, about four miles away, or visits to the El Segundo Air Force base hosted by Lancaster, a retired lieutenant colonel.

Because tenants' work schedules vary widely, social gatherings are small and infrequent. It is typical for a few people to organize an impromptu happy hour in one of the larger rigs, such as Lancaster's coach, which is known as the Chateau. It has satellite TV, plush carpeting and walnut-stained cabinetry.

Lancaster's wife, a teacher in Seattle, likes the Chateau as well and occasionally flies down on Friday nights to explore Los Angeles over the weekend. "It's great fun and adventurous," Marlene Lancaster said.
But other tenants, like Rogers, can't wait for their days off to escape their cramped RVs, the din of aircraft and the tedium of Lot B.

One pilot who lives in Texas and commutes to a trailer in Lot E says the camper is simply "a place to come and get ready for work." He often flies to LAX the night before his work schedule begins and sleeps in his 1979 RV, where he keeps his uniforms. And when his flying schedule is done, he typically ends up at LAX late in the day—too late to catch a flight back home.

Rather than a hotel room, which he says he can't afford, or an inexpensive shared apartment, he enjoys his camper, wearing ear plugs at night to sleep through the noise of jets overhead.

"I never thought I would be here, but pay cuts force us to be frugal," he said. "Commuting is tough. I'd rather live at a base, but there are a lot of issues with airlines and I can't just pick up and move my family and kids."

Regional airline employees have a particularly difficult challenge — they earn far less than pilots and flight attendants at major airlines, and their airlines shift planes and routes around frequently.

Another pilots stated that, “When you’re making below $30,000 or $40,000 a year, how much money can you afford to spend on a second home at a base?”

Schedule cuts through the recession have meant lots of shifting between bases — a few bases were closed, and most shrunk, forcing some workers to change bases."
 
Do they have full hook ups?
I imagine they would get pretty toasty during the day there if not. And what about the tank full of grumpies? They HAVE to have full hook ups, right????
 
Itchy said:
Do they have full hook ups?
I imagine they would get pretty toasty during the day there if not. And what about the tank full of grumpies? They HAVE to have full hook ups, right????
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If it's Lot E they're talking about, I don't park there anymore...but I don't really remember there being any provisions for RVs anywhere therein.
 
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