[jopolous]

I think what some people don't understand here is how working with the FAA is fundamentally different than the DMV.

The DMV has to keep as many people driving as reasonably possible, since in the US it's practically impossible to live life normally without a car (excepting major cities)

Flying, on the other hand, is viewed as a privilege by the FAA. You do not have a right to fly anything. And the FAA will do everything it can to make sure flying is safe, even if it means barring the majority of the population from ever qualifying to fly.

I don't think they will treat drones any differently.

So to everyone who is shocked at how hard the FAA is being about drones, welcome to flying. This is par for the course for us pilots.

[pravda]

>You do not have a right to fly anything.

AFAIK, you don't need a license or formal training, or anything, to fly an ultralight.

Well, except for the ultralight.

[tzs]

You don't need a license or formal training, but the reason for that is not because there is some right to fly ultralights. It is because the FAA rules specifically give permission to fly ultalights without a license or formal training. See 14 CFR 103.7 [1].

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/103.7

[jopolous]

Actually, that's a very good point. There are some important restrictions regarding airspace but there are legal ways to get up in the air by yourself without any training

Good call out there

[copperx]

The willingness to risk your own life in an ultralight is enough to satisfy the FAA that you followed some minimal due diligence; however, you're not risking anything by flying a drone except a few dollars.

[mrfusion]

The tenth amendment would beg to differ!

[Dylan16807]

It's ridiculous to compare this to cars. The size category is .5 to 55 pounds. A 55 pound car is called a 'toy' and given to five year olds. You should have just as much right to fly a tiny drone as you have to fly a kite.

[dtwest]

If it is ridiculous to compare drones to cars, it is also ridiculous to compare drones to kites. All three have different risk profiles. To have something that could weigh the same as a bowling ball fall on you is different than a kite on the end of a string. 55 pounds isn't tiny in this context.

That being said, cars are clearly the most dangerous of the three. But they are what we are most dependent on as well.

[anilakar]

Should pedestrians be allowed to loiter on motorways?

[SenorSourdough]

Only if they are less than 55 pounds.

[Dylan16807]

If we pave the entire world, then yes.

If you want to keep people out of the places cars are actually supposed to go, but let them be on sidewalks and such, then it's fine to have some restrictions. And likewise let drones fly under 400 feet.

But you shouldn't be banning people from the roads either, that's been a big problem making cities worse over the last century.

[gmiller123456]

Your assertion that people don't have a right to fly is fundamentally flawed. Whether or not I have a legal right assigned by the government is unrelated to fundamental human rights. Most people would agree the government doesn't have the right to tell people not to do something without a very good reason. And that's where the disagreement is. No one is saying the FAA doesn't have the legal authority to tell people what to do, the complaint is they don't have a good reason for the rules they're trying to implement.

[mattmaroon]

You must be a commercial pilot! They seem surprisingly lax to me about general aviation.

[jopolous]

Definitely lax in some ways, but medically it's incredible what they will latch on to and disqualify people for

Things are getting better though, they're getting less rules-minded and more safety-minded. But the proposals around drones don't seem out of the ordinary for FAA regulations to me

[mattmaroon]

Some of their regs are pretty antiquated. They can disqualify people for using prescribed ADD meds for example with would actually make one a better pilot.

But the bar for a PPL was surprisingly low to me in many ways and the sport pilot license is shocking.

[aidenn0]

ADD meds can also be abused to keep one awake past the point where it is safe to fly though. They were used for this purpose long before they were discovered to help with ADD, which was in turn long before "Adult ADD" was considered a valid diagnosis.

[blackflame]

Yea the 90s might have been the steroid era in baseball, but players beforehand were regularly consuming greenies as performance enhancers. https://www.razorgator.com/blog/remember-when-everyone-in-th...

[illgenr]

I really regret not getting the sport license before my grampa couldn't pass his medical anymore. Would have loved if he could have kept his plane so I could take him up once in a while.

[cjbprime]

Am curious how this would have worked -- sport pilots are restricted to flying Light Sport Aircraft, which seem to be very uncommon. Was your grandpa's plane one?

[BrianHenryIE]

In addition, interestingly:

> The Department of Motor Vehicles was created in 1915 with the enactment of Senator E.S. Birdsall's "Vehicle Act of 1915." Vehicle registrations that year had climbed to 191,000.

https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/dmv/?1dmy&urile=wcm:path:/dmv_...