I used to think along similar lines. I haven’t been around drones very long, but the more I learn the less I want to share the airspace with the majority of the users.
I haven’t seen this level of intentional non-compliance with regulation anywhere else in aviation. The “I always fly vlos. Unless I think I don’t need to due to x, y, and z justifications,” or the “I always fly 400’ agl unless I need or want to fly higher” and of course the straight up “I don’t really care what the faa says they have no business telling me what to do” attitudes is prevalent.
Then there’s the people who seemingly want to do the right thing and actually fly in compliance but don’t because they don’t know what they don’t know (see every other thread in this sub-forum.)
There’s no justification for recreational flying in controlled airspace before any training or certification takes place. Require training and actual testing of knowledge before that occurs. Requiring a minimum knowledge level of people using the nas, particularly in controlled airspace is not asking too much.
Ideally there would be levels of certification, just as there are with real pilot certificates. For example, a hobby flyer would require little to no knowledge or training, but wouldn’t be able to operate in controlled airspace. A recreational flyer would have similar privileges to a sport pilot- class e or class d airspace. Then a commercial which would equate to a 107 remote pilot cert now and allow operations in more complex airspace, with authorization, of course.
Granted it only takes a few "bad apples" to create a problem or possibly cause a life threating event. The piloted and/or human transporting aircraft certainly take priority.
Although, I disagree it's not a blanket wide situation, the high majority of sUAV Owners aren't abusing the altitude regulations; not by willingness to follow laws most don't even know about but more for fear of their own property. There is a percentage of abusers that could be a threat to aircraft and life; the majority would be hobbyist, followed in smaller percentage of PT107.
I forgot the numbers and for this post's point not that important; The number of sUAV's is huge and grossly outnumbers the piloted aircraft. The same is true of Owning or Pilots; the percentage or raw numbers of Pilots compared to sUAV Owner/Flyers is a needle flicker in comparison. The majority of these are hobbyist, small percentage PT107. The majority of this Mavic forum are Hobbyist and they're inquiring on LAANC.
I'd agree, near airports and within flight paths of lower altitude shouldn't be any uneducated, non-licensed & non-insured commercial sUAV, and even the commercial pilot in these areas probably needs even additional requirements to aid ATC to identify and see their position... that will probably be required soon. Although throughout a city, the radius of the airport's airspace covers a lot of ground over parks, rivers, residential homes, and various sights that attract photography. Many of these are 400-1000 feet below surrounding structures that prevent any flight paths or threat... for the sUAV 400 foot regulation. Cities are often below airport elevation and that indirectly adds to the margins.
This all equates to the understanding that it "WILL" occur, thousands of sUAV will be in the airspace and enforcement would be harder than Firework's enforcement. For enforcement to be even marginally effective, that would also require the FAA to authorize even more liberal policies to State, City & LEO than even currently proposed. That mis-use of authority could become a negative for "ALL sUAV" activity, the City & LEO's won't separate the PT107... so far that hasn't been the case in various LEO charges. I'm not sure I'm ready for that flood gate to open without applying additional layers of regulation of understanding and authorities. If it's going to occur, then addressing the problem to manage will help more than just stating you can't fly... kinda encouraging ill-behavior vs encouraging cooperation.
If the airspace will have sUAV's present, like the highways have commercial & standard (aka: Hobbyist) drivers. You need some fashion of accountability, regulation and authority. If we could get a grasp of what's in the airspace and where, it would be much better than not simply knowing. Encourage Hobbyist to register... actually like a firearm, I think an sUAV should be registered at the Point of Sale! Transfer if needed (gift, re-sold), but accounted for when sold and assigned an FAA Number. If it's needing to be accounted for, that shouldn't begin with a new Owner... it should start with the Sale. At that time, add requirements... a short awareness / competency exam. If that scares a small number off, probably a good thing. If the Owner has any type of sUAV certification: Hobby, Commercial, etc then pre-sale requirements waived, but still FAA registered and accounted. That would assist in hundreds of "found" drones and tracking the Owner.
The technology we receive in prosumer / consumer scale sUAV's is not supported solely by PT107 Owners, many sales go to hobbyist and without their purchase power the commercial side wouldn't have a fraction of the technology it currently reaps.
This doesn't include the small percentage of high-end $15-100K professional sUAV that meet the requirements of specialty shops... although even some of their recent technologies have been driven or motivated by prosumer features.
All in all, I'd rather have local ATC's aware of the airspace and the location of sUAV's. If encouragement and allowance is provided, the Hobbyist will most likely follow the rules and that helps with knowing where they're flying. As for the small percentage of idiots that choose to abuse and risk safety... no different than now, we'll need to add a layer of protection methodologies and when apprehended actually prosecute to establish it won't be tolerated.
The companies can also help reduce the abusers, control the software variables more tightly. Require some form of "key" or justification to modify the altitude above 400 feet or LAANC sector max, also required for distance. This simple FW change could reduce the majority of abusers, not many are going to research hacked FW or methods to back door the FW... the majority abuse when abusing is simplistic to perform.
On the requirements and licenses (certificates). I would agree, you're totally correct although I don't think we'll have 2-3 categories. We'll probably have 2 Hobby, 2-4 Commercial. The upper end commercial will hold additional permissions through verifications of skills and craft. Examples would be BVLOS missions, Payload delivery, Medical delivery, Inspection of structures in direct flight lines, Security missions, etc. The PT107 classification will be at the bottom of the Commercial clarifications.
