TEB VFR Waypoints Provides Guidance to Runway 1 – With a Catch

Dec. 22, 2022

The proximity of New Jersey’s Teterboro Airport (TEB) to other nearby airports creates a challenge with approaches, particularly to Runway 01. Currently, it’s common practice to perform an ILS to Runway 06, then circle for a landing at Runway 01. However, that is only possible in good visual meteorological conditions.

The Teterboro Users Group and the FAA have worked together to provide lateral guidance for a straight-in approach to Runway 01 using two VFR waypoints – VPDAU and VPEZA.

“The intent was to provide lateral and vertical guidance if you are performing an ILS approach for Runway 6 to allow a straight-in approach to Runway 01,” said Eric Canup, chair of NBAA’s Domestic Operations Committee. However, these VFR waypoints do not appear on published instrument procedures, and most nav databases do not include VFR waypoints, Canup explained.

Also, there is no way to modify data in most FMSs to include these VFR waypoints, making the VFR waypoints difficult or impossible to implement in practice.

The FAA is working on a more reliable solution to an approach to Runway 01 – an RNAV approach with lateral and vertical guidance to the Runway 01 threshold, based on the existing RNAV approach to Runway 06. This concept builds on work done at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK).

Richard Boll, a member of NBAA’s Access Committee and chair of the ATC, Airspace and Flight Technologies Working Group, explained the FAA saw the benefit of a method used at JFK, using an RNAV approach with lateral and vertical guidance along a “guided visual segment” to the runway, and so is incorporating that method elsewhere, including at New York’s LaGuardia Airport (LGA) Runway 31 approach.

A draft concept approach is complete and stakeholders believe the new approach will be safe and effective with no environmental concerns, as it follows existing tracks. NBAA expects the approach will be published in 2023.

Pilots and operators should review the VFR waypoints and determine whether those waypoints are available in the nav databases before attempting to use them in an actual approach. If an operator’s nav database includes the waypoints, they should be available with the Dec. 1 nav database update.

When using these waypoints, pilots must ensure that their programming in the FMS does not interfere with the loaded, published instrument approach if the FMS is being used to fly any part of that approach.