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Very soon, possibly within the next five years, the 50-to-60 passenger helibus will be produced. This will bring another application of passenger helicopter service, the transport of large numbers of people from downtown to key suburban points.
Such past progress and future promise gives a very positive and affirmative answer to one of the basic questions you face in this inquiry, namely: Should subsidy, at a diminishing rate and lasting only five more years, be continued for a scheduled passenger helicopter operations in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles?
Of course, it should.
The subsidy program was conceived as an experiment to determine, through experience in three cities, whether helicopter technology would be useful in helping to solve transportation problems for major cities throughout the country.
When the service began, more than 75 per cent of revenue came from subsidy. This dependence upon subsidy has fallen to the point where, according to the latest available figures--for the first 11 months of 1964--46.7 per cent of revenue came from subsidy. And there is a guarantee of a reduction to zero in five years.
Imaginative developments in passenger helicopters and lessons learned about their operation brought the cost of operating a seat mile down from 63.4 cents in 1957 to 30.8 cents in 1964.
Better reliability of service is the number one requirement for non-subsidized operation and great strides are being made in this direction through the introduction of all-weather navigation systems and the development of engines with greater lift.