Aiming to cater for the ramp in its widest context, Ramp Equipment News is now celebrating its fourth year of production. We have kept to the recipe that has proved successful, offering the magazine in both on-line and printed format, so that readers can benefit to the maximum.

The aviation sector is still mirroring the actions of a proverbial roller-coaster: whilst low cost carriers continue to set the pace, the traditional airlines have had to look at reinventing themselves to a certain degree. To that end, ancillary fees and tariffs have become the order of the day: these additional revenue streams have helped swell the airlines’ coffers but have provided little cheer for the handler, who still has to survive at the sharp end of the equation. Handler margins are thus an ongoing subject of debate and this emotive topic crops up continually within the pages of Ramp Equipment News.

What happens in the Americas isn’t the whole story, however: we endeavour to bring our readership up to date with trends and practices from elsewhere around the globe, developments (such as environmental or security issues) that may impinge on the US in the fullness of time. By offering this global perspective we believe that our readership will benefit accordingly.

What’s in store for the coming year? Readers may like to know that we will be carrying a variety of features on topics of relevance to the ramp and the airport environment. Amongst the highlights will be a survey of pushbacks, where we’ll be looking at the relative values of towbarless compared to traditional tractors; telematics will be updated, to see how its adoption is progressing; and there will be a report on emissions, in line with the developments in cleaning up diesel engines. This is just a taster, of course; in addition we will carry our regular columns on ramp safety, new GSE and IT, as well as present words of advice from our legal panel.

Ramp Equipment News is also proud to be part of the industry’s new body, the International Airport Equipment Manufacturers’ Association, which is making its mark on the GSE sector.

To end on a publicity note, Ramp Equipment News will be distributed at major events in North America as well as elsewhere in the world, thereby giving you a chance to maximise your product’s exposure.