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existing reliever system, operational shortfalls will be experienced. Preceding tasks of the study identified the following deficiencies in the existing reliever system: The existing system does not provide the metropolitan area with adequate coverage by intermediate airports. The reliever airports must provide attractive and relatively equal facilities to the airport they are relieving to adequately fulfill their reliever roles. A survey of local and transient general aviation pllots conducted for this study indicates that pilots often consider ttmway length in selecting Minneapolis-St. Paul International for -their operations. St. Paul Downtown is currently the only reliever airport in the system with a runway length in excess of 5,000 feet; by virtue of this length, it is the only intermediate airport in the existing reliever system. Provision of additional coverage by an intermediate airport would have the potential to draw additional traffic from Minneapolis-St. Paul International. Minnesota Statute 473.641 Subdivision 4, enacted in the 1980 session of the Minnesota Legislature, prohibits MAC from expanding or upgrading the use of an existing metropolitan airport from minor use to intermediate use statutes as defined in the Metropolitan Development Guide. It is possible in the longer term planning period that this restriction could limit the effectiveness of the reliever system. The degree to which the reliever system may be impacted by this statute to a great extent is tied to the region's selected approach for meeting its long-term commercial airport needs. Should the region choose a course of action to maximize the long-term useful life of Minneapolis-St. Paul International, every attempt will need to be made to accommodate non-essential general aviation traffic within the reliever system. In order to meet this objective, additional runways in excess of 5,000 feet would be required. Revision to Minnesota Statute 473.641 Subdivision 4 would be required. Many of the transient general aviation aircraft operations now being performed at 14limteapolis-St. Paul International are by the more sophisticated portion of the fleet. These aircraft require full precision instrumentation during instrument flight rule (IFR) operating conditions. The existing reliever system has IFR coverage deficiencies. Operational capacity is the greatest shortfall for the existing reliever system. Currently, all relievers, with the exception of Anoka County-Blaine, are operating at less than 80 percent of capaaty, indicating only minor delay. Delay is currently estimated at slightly more than 600,000 minutes. If no capacity enhancements are provided, 6.2 million minutes of annual delay will be experienced for the system as a whole by 2008. While delay at some reliever system airports will average less than two minutes per operation, delay could approach 20 minutes per operation at other relievers. V-3