Ah Choo! I Feel Soo Congested . . .

First museums, then cars, then the subway and now airplanes:

New Yorkers by next summer could be paying higher airfares and have access to fewer flights, as the Federal Aviation Administration says it is eyeing congestion pricing and a cap on flights arriving and departing from John F. Kennedy International Airport in an effort to reduce crippling airline delays.

Responding to a summer marked by the worst flight delays since the FAA started keeping records in 1995, President Bush said yesterday there is “a lot of anger amongst our citizens” about unreliable flight schedules.

Mr. Bush has asked his secretary of transportation, Mary Peters, to convene a task force of airline executives and officials from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to make recommendations on how to reduce air traffic delays at JFK and throughout the New York region. The group is to issue recommendations by the end of 2007.

Airlines could be charged steeper fees to land their planes during peak hours, which could work as an incentive to steer more flights into off-peak slots, Ms. Peters said. Airlines would be expected to pass on the extra costs to customers.