Aviation

AirTran Airways has become the latest victim of the Department of Transportation's new rules prohibiting airlines from advertising fares without including the taxes and fees that will have to be paid by potential customers.

DOT announced Wednesday that it was fining AirTran $60,000 for violating its new rules, which were included in a Passenger's Bill of Rights adopted by the agency in 2010. The agency said AirTran, which is in the middle of a merger with Southwest Airlines, noted that taxes would apply when it advertised $59 one-way fares in the fall of 2011, but that the airline did not quantify the additional charges for passengers.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said in a statement that “Consumers have a right to know the full price they will be paying when they buy an airline ticket.”

After vowing to assemble new U.S. Air Force tanker planes in Kansas, Boeing will now build them in Washington state.

Your morning transportation speed-read:

Airlines are protesting a new Department of Transportation rule that requires them to include taxes in their advertised prices.

A California panel has recommended state lawmakers reject $2.7 billion in bonds that would fund a proposed high-speed rail there.

Public transit riders in Boston could be in for fare hikes.

U.S. Airways has added flights to Washington, D.C.

Your morning transportation speed-read:

Republican presidential candidates are not talking much now about transportation, but they have in the past.

The Transportation Security Administration says it caught a former military member trying to carry explosives through airport security in Texas.

A plane slid off a runway after landing in Ohio.

Miami is about to get a new Metrorail line to its airport.

Your morning transportation speed-read:

Massachusetts is considering a law to force auto manufacturers to share information with repair shops.

A new report questions the potential for job creation by a proposed high-speed rail in California.

The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority will be offering free rides for Christmas and New Year's Eve.

Police have been deployed in an airport security strike in Paris.

Your morning transportation speed-read:

Airport security workers in Paris are on strike.

Detroit's Metro International Airport has the healthiest food in the country.

Washington's MetroRail has pulled 16 rail cars from service following a shutdown this week.

The federal government is providing $10 million for a light-rail interchange in Minneapolis.

National Transportation Safety Board Chairwoman Deborah Hersman said Wednesday that she liked the Federal Aviation Administration's new scheduling rules for avoiding fatigue among commercial airline pilots, but she wished the rules applied to cargo flights as well.

Hersman said in statement that the new FAA rules were "a huge improvement over the status quo for large passenger-carrying operations."

But she quickly added "a tired pilot is a tired pilot, whether there are 10 paying customers on board or 100, whether the payload is passengers or pallets."

The lawmaker said FAA's new rules on pilot fatigue were an improvement but pilots had a responsibility for safety too.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood acknowledged it had taken "too long" to finish the new rules.

The Federal Aviation Administration will release new rules for addressing pilot fatigue on Wednesday, after months of prodding from the families of victims from a 2009 crash near Buffalo, N.Y.

The families of Continental Airlines Flight 3407, who have formed a lobbying group in Washington, have called for reforms to pilot scheduling ever since the National Transportation Safety Board ruled that fatigue had been a factor in the 2009 plane crash near Buffalo.

The FAA said Tuesday that that its acting administrator, Michael Huerta, would announce the new rules for fatigue procedures at a news conference Wednesday in Washington.