Aviation by the numbers

If you listened only to the alphabet groups, you'd swear general aviation is on its last legs. Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. A release of data by the U.S. Census Bureau shows the extent to which aviation is changing.

For example, according to the Census Bureau:

The number of public use airports dropped to 5,221 in 2007 from 5,233 in 2006. That's 300 fewer airports than 1990, but it's 407 more than in 1980.

The number of piston general aviation aircraft increased by 1.9% from 06 to 07.

The number of private pilots dropped 1 percent.The number of private pilots airplane rating went down 3.7 percent. The number of student pilots stayed about the same. The number of instrument ratings went up.

Here's the data.