Quote[/b] (mcrwt644 @ Feb. 09 2004,18:03)]spectabilis73-I use to work in san diego. I worked on NASNI (which is the naval station for those who may not know). I controlled the airspace from about San clemente island south past TJ. I also worked the areas off of Big Sur, Salinas, and Oakland. So I am familiar with all of the nocal stuff. Towers are still used, probably more then ever. Basically, there are severaly layers to the Air Traffic system. 1-the tower, they get you up to about 10k feet or so, depending, and hand you off to 2 approach control and they can take you as high as 23k feet or so. Then there is us, the center. We handle you up at the highest elevations, as well as to the ground in some spots. I control around Raliegh NC, and there are places known as uncontrolled airports where pilots do their own thing and we clear them to where ever after that. It can get to be very busy. We handle in the neighborhood of 8500 operations on any given day.