Unlike AI aircraft SID/STARS which will take an extensive expansion of the active AI zone, the user aircraft SID/STARS can be addressed as a flight planning challenge and a voice pack challenge.One point - I get the impression that many people consider STARs replace approaches. While some STARs are for specific runways and the charts may include localizer and runway information, by definition a STAR is a "Standard Terminal Area Arrival" which is to get your aircraft from the airway to the approach. Not replace the approach - and FS2004 has a very extensive and good approach system.The voice first. One of the major advantages of a SID/STAR is that many individual waypoints can be addressed by pilots, flight planners and controllers in a very short concise manner. So naturally the voices of the SID/STAR names and their transition waypoints need to be recorded.Another voice challenge is navigation aids. The voice will need the ability to address enroute waypoints by name. I'm sure that initially most of these would be addressed by the phonetic alphabet.At this time I am not certain despite dozens, maybe hundreds of hours of looking at AI aircraft commands and behavior if the FS2004 system directs aircraft to waypoints or to Lat/Long coordinates which match waypoints.Approach waypoints are be coded by a name - i.e. fixIdent="LEROS". Our user flight plans are coded by waypoint names. Hopefully it will not take an extensive recoding effort to identify the waypoints / navaids being used for the next fix for aircraft.We need to have the capability to have the ATC system issue a voice command - "Cleared direct to MEEOW" as an example on the BONHAM FIVE star to airports in the Dallas/ Fort Worth area.The system will need the capability to issue a voice command for the transition waypoints - because STARs will need a transition waypoint between the STAR and the actual runway approach. In much of the world a STAR will serve several airports in the same "terminal area" and many STAR include the final statement "Expect radar vectors to final approach course"So we need (1) a lot of voice recordings - probably more than the current entire voice pack, and (2) a trigger event in the programming to issue the command.On the flight planner side it will be a bit easier. The current system will support waypoints and approachs which extended transitions.Jim Vile has been able to make AI and user aircraft be directed on the MACEY TWO arrival for KATL - with the MACEY intersection as the initial waypoint.This waypoint is the place where traffic from four different routings joins the same path into KATL, .The FS flight planner needs two additional options:Low Altitude Airways with SID/STARandHigh Altitude Airways with SID/STARJust as you can choose your parking or start location for the departure airport when FS reads the APnnnnn.bgl file or an addon scenery file created by AFCAD, SceneGenX or other program.The departure airport will need the ability to select from a list of departure procedures - and a final fix point on the SID/DP. Two additional selection boxes.The arrival airport will need the same thing - the STAR and an initial fix for the STAR.Then the route should be calculated by the current process - just rather than between two airports - the route will be calculated between the SID final waypoint and the STAR entry wayoint. Then displayed easily on the flight planner map screen.Saving the flight plan would tell the program which voice files to play.There will be some additional programming required to make the tower controller say "Cleared for takeoff and departure on SUMMT THREE. Fly runway heading until altitude 1540 and turn to 279 direct to SNUFY" and the departure controller to say "Turn to 003 when crossing SNUFFY direct to ZELAN - continue as filed"The same for the STAR.Enroute contacts with controllers should also include the next waypoint in the enroute flight plan in the voice.Now what happens when the weather changes and the arrival airport runways reverse. For many airports worldwide the only change will be the vectors in the final stages from the STAR to the APPROACH.For other airports, or other STARs, the filed flight plan will now be invalid. Such as the YENNI One for KLAX.This can be addressed in a couple ways.One would be to add a preferred landing runway to the flight planner process. When the user aircraft gets within about 100 miles of the arrival airport and the arrival airport airport information and weather is read and the arrival runways set - the pilot of the user aircraft can be told by ATC - "Your planned arrival is no longer available - please select an alternate approach"Basically the same time/ place - the User aircraft is assigned an approach in FS2004. The selection menu would change a bit - but that would be main necessary change.I still believe having the program choose a best approach would induce too many variables and too much programming work for MS to consider it possible to be done in a relatively bug free, relaible manner.We have to expect pilots to be willing to learn approaches and be familiar enough with them to make informed approach choices.There probably should be an "EASY" button - to allow the user to opt out of a complex approach and revert to the novice mode of vectors to final.So - to implement these procedures we need:(1) Voice pack recordings and trigger events to use them(2) Changes in the flight planner.Some additional things which I believe would greatly enhance the process for the user aircraft and it's integration with AI aircraft based on the current size active aircraft zone.(1) Use the existing speed and altitude tags in FS2004 approaches - make those part of the enroute clearance process - "Turn right to 249 - Cleared direct to MITTS - cross at 10,500 - maintain 225 knots" I'm looking on another computer at an AI AAL B738 inbound to Rwy 6R at CYUL, from KMIA - FS shows the aircraft has a targed airspeed KIAS of 200 kts and altitude of 2999 ft for the FAF waypoint.Separation and airspeed after crossing the FAF is now totally up to the individual aircraft flight dynamics. Some mechanism to maintain separation via airspeed or turns would be a very desirable goal.(2) Load balancing on runways for AI aircraft. Currently AI, and user, aircraft as usually assigned to the runway closest to their departure airport. At some airports with one ILS runway and one runway with GPS approaches we have observed AI aircraft being directed to the second non-ILS runway after the five approach slots on the ILS runway have been allocated. This is a very new discovery and needs much more testing to determine if it is a consistent process in FS2004. However, the ATC system does need the ability to direct AI aircraft to other open runways when the "que" is filled, rather than doubling up.(3) Arrivals in excess of the runway / airport capacity - holds exist in the current approaches. They are usable by the user aircraft in FS2004. The GPS flies them perfectly. AI aircraft need the ability to be directed into holds and the criteria for exit needs to be both altitude and place in the landing que. BTW using holds for descent would enable AI aircraft to fly with some level of realism at flight levels above 360 and make descents without having to dive at 7,000, 9,000 or 17,000 FPM to make waypoints.However this is will be a controversial issue. People will add AI traffic to jam the approaches of any airport and create holds of hours in length before an aircraft can land. At some point AI aircraft on hold will disappear because they must be at the gate to start their next flight leg. I would propose that the AI system limit the number of aircraft which can be inbound to any runway - the excess would be deleted from in the air and generated at the gate.I know aircraft popping into existence at the gate is a very distruptive event to the FS experience - but other than completely deleting the AI aircraft for it's current and subsequent legs - I don't see how it can be avoided.(4) The user aircraft needs the option of requesting priority approach handling. Let the AI fly three hour long holds - I don't want to. BTW I'm sure everyone knows the easy way to avoid long takeoff holds and delays - taxi to a different runway intersection and request takeoff - your will be the second or third aircraft given clearance depending upon whether or not aircraft enter the end intersection from both sides of the runway.(5) In VMC AI aircraft should use alternate approaches rather than visual if an ILS approach is not available. This capability already exists - the AI aircraft do use these approaches - LDA, Localizer, Offset, GPS/RNAV, NDB, VOR in IMC.(6) The ability to have multiple non-parallel runways open for landing / takeoff without the current fake runway cheat. Possibly a runway property to tie the different runway ends together. This would not be a perfect flexible solutions for pre-WWII design airports like KORD or KBOS in all wind conditions but would give them one multiple runway working combination in each direction.Now these are obviously not the entire solutions, or the only possible changes to help implement the option of SID/STARs.The programming would be extensive and expensive.But I do believe a user aircraft option for SID/STAR is achievable.

Reading this over, I realize I left out some very big concerns.One is addon aircraft and flight planners. Since the whole discussion is over the FS ATC and flight planner - these need the ability to export their fight plans, FMS systems to a format which the FS ATC can read and understand.Second is updates. The approaches in FS2004 are designed to make the GPS function, like the approach data in real world FMS/ GPS units, within the limits of FS. This is much more complex and much more data than the AIRAC updates.It is going to be very difficult to update the data between versions of FS. Not impossible - but no addon vendor has considered it worth the investment in FS2004.Third is regionalization. I live in the United States and most of my information is based on US procedures, flights in the jump seat of the jets my company owns and US charts.STAR and DP in the US are BIG often long enough to cross entire European countries.I've been told by pilots who have extensive flight experience in both regions that European STARs more closely resemble the old "Initial Approach Procedures" which were much shorter range and frankly cannot support current traffic levels.Also Europe has the national boundary issue. This is a significant impact to planning and coordination.It would be completely unrealistic to expect Microsoft to design two different sets of operational rules for the different regions, in my opinion. All of us will have to accept a middle ground if MS is ever to consider implementing some of these suggestions.

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Your posts bring a welcome breath of realism to this subject. Regionalisation is a problem that I suspect would be difficult to address realistically.In what follows it's necessary to remember that the description is of what generally happens. ATC can, and does, make changes for operational reasons.In the UK, a STAR begins at a waypoint which has one or more Airways associated with it. The ASTRA 1A STAR for Gatwick is associated with R8 (FL 150 and below) and N866 (FL 100 and below). As a result, the choice of STAR is determined by the last Airways leg flown and not by the runway in use. This is possible because a STAR ends at a waypoint from which there are Approach Procedures to all runways/directions. These place the aircraft on the extended centreline after which an Instrument Approach can be flown to touchdown. In fact these Approach Procedures are not generally used because aircraft are normally sequenced under radar control from the end of the STAR to the extended runway centreline. In other words there are 3 separate stages/procedures - (1) STAR, (2) Approach Procedure, and (3) Instrument/Final Approach.On the subject of international boundaries, the boundary between British and French ATC regions is about 75nm from Heathrow and even closer to Gatwick at about 55nm. I'm not sure if this still applies, but it was the case that aircraft had to be in level flight when they were handed over between Britain/France. This would introduces yet another complication.Also, some parts of Airways which are in British airspace, have their ATS delegated to a foreign centre, for example UM142 south of 492904N 0050326W is delegated to Brest (French) ACC.Turning to SIDs, they also have Airways routes associated with them. The LAMBOURNE SID from Gatwick is for Airways Routes N57, UN57, L10, UL10 (N601, UN601 via BPK). There are so-called tactical SIDs from Gatwick (TIGER and WIZAD). These effectively duplicate the DVER, LAM and CLN SIDS. They may not be used for flight planning purposes but are used to alleviate congestion and "may be offered at a late stage of taxying".There is the BIG SID from Gatwick that some FS route generators use because it's published. However in reality, it's only for aircraft positioning from Gatwick to Heathrow or Northolt.British ATC will reject an IFR flight plan that doesn't use a published SID. SIDs reflect the Noise Preferential Routing as so ATC will not divert a flight from a SID onto a more direct route until it has reached 4000ft typically. After that ATC may offer a more direct routing when conditions allow.Doesn't life get complicated when you introduce the real world?