If Chris Burgess reads this I invite him to comment. We routinely did air taxi operations as would a helicopter, including low fly-by over taxi ways both along the length, as well as angular crossing overs. This was 15 years ago, and in discussions with other CFIs recently it was told to me that this is considered to be an older interpretation of the regs and that in the most recent interpretations gyroplanes are no longer permitted to do air taxi over the taxiways. Bummer. That is just stupid.
To me it has always been the safest way for me to avoid incoming jets, and using the taxiway for air taxi (low fly-by) while avoiding over-flying ground traffic puts me in a place where I don't have to worry about getting run over while giving me the best vantage point to assess traffic just before turning a short 180° - which amounts to turning from downwind to base to final all in one swoop with perhaps throttle shut completely to idle and thus steep descent - is done with as much safety as humanly possible.
I have demonstrated at Wrens that I can safely and routinely do a 180 at 20 ft AGL within a ~20 ft radius, losing only about 3 ft of altitude with my 600lb tandem Air Command, Skywheels rotorblades, and 145 HP Yamaha YG4. Walk in the park. Let's see a FW do this. Helicopter? NP.
When FW pilots see a helicopter do an air taxi they think nothing of it. No one rings up the FAA and files a complaint. But when gyrocopter does it they get their panties in a bunch and call the FAA to complain and the problems start.
At untowered CJT when I spoke with the local Atlanta FAA 10 years ago they agreed it would be acceptable and safest to use the taxiway for take offs and landings when FW traffic was present, at my discretion and avoiding all other ground traffic, after I related the incident below.
I never had a single complaint - until one guy who had bullied me on several occasions while we were both operating our aircraft on the field at the same time took a photo of me in my gyro one day and sent it on to be handed to the FAA with a complaint that I had over flown ground traffic. In fact, I brought to the attention of the investigating parties that when you took a direct measurement of the photo of my gyro over the airplane that had just landed and was taxiing to the hangers, my gyro would have to be 28 feet long in order to have been directly over the FW. Case closed, that was the end of it.
Regs and interpretations should always be about safety first, not getting into a pissin match about whether or not a gyro can operate as a helicopter or a fixed wing. I believe the FAA in general recognizes this, and my dealings with them have always been cordial and fair.
I spoke with a local FAA rep yesterday since gyro traffic is picking up at my untowered CUB airport with a new AR1, a Tango, and my own Air Commands, and I want to be able to advise my fellow rotorcraft pilots what is expected at this facility so as not to ruffle any more feathers than we need to and to be able to depend on the local FAA to back us up should a complaint be filed.
Most of the FAA folks don't really understand gyroplanes. The gentleman I spoke with yesterday was completely unaware that not only can a gyro land vertically in an emergency, but that there is an entire breed of gyrocopters designed to routinely land vertically (Monarch Butterfly), or that a helicopter in autorotation lands exactly the same way as any gyroplane in normal flight. He admitted he was a FW pilot with little understanding of gyrocopters.
Gyrocopters sit on the runway for long periods of time pre-rotating for take off. That is more like a helicopter than a fixed wing. This extends exposure to incoming traffic which may not be aware of its presence.
Gyrocopters are much smaller than fixed wing, and are harder to pick up visually on the runway and in the air. This increases danger, much the same way a motorcyle is not noticed as easily as a car or truck and can be overlooked.
90% of gyrocopters approach to land very steeply and slowly, from any direction into the wind, and come to a full stop immediately upon touchdown - exactly the same way that helicopters do, and nothing like a FW. 90% of gyros land and stop with very little ground roll, if any at all to speak of. That is like a helicopter, and FW are nothing like the typical gyro landing in calm conditions with no head wind. You will never see a FW land on a busy RW and come to a full stop immediately, but all rotocraft with the exception of the eurotub breed do so 90% of the time.
The only thing a gyrocopter and a FW have in common is an extended roll out to take off. After that a gyrocopter operates exactly like a helicopter with but one exception: gyrocopters do not hover in place under power and maintain altitude or climb vertically. This should not be that much of a difference in safety considerations for operating from taxiways doing low-speed, low altitude air taxi ops, since the crux of safety in this case depends not on hover nor take off but rather how the machine handles in the air, and lands and stops upon touchdown. A FW has no way to turn very sharp and slow in the air or stop immediately upon landing, and is a danger to everything around it and itself until it can be braked and stopped.
More like a helicopter than a FW a gyrocopter can turn in an extremely small radius, at a very slow speed, to avoid collison.
FW aircraft stall. Gyrocopters do not. That is a huge difference.
Gyrocopters can and do land and operate - other than hover and vertical climb - just like a helicopter, not a FW. To lump gyrocopters into the same category as FW and force them to operate only from the runway when a safely separated and unoccupied taxiway is available increases the possibility for collisions and close encounters.
I am preaching to the choir?
For now I am not flying low over the taxiway, and not using the taxi for landings or take-off. I don't like it, because there is a lot of jet traffic here and it is ignorantly ridiculous that I be forced to land on the runway just because someone thinks I turn, land, stall and stop like an airplane when in fact I do not and do so like a helicopter. A taxiway is for taxiing, and I can't even do a helicopter style air taxi? C'mon now, we all know this is ridiculous.
But that is the interpretation of the regs I got from the local FAA yesterday. I have to operate under strict FW regs, even though there there is nothing about building nor flying my gyroplanes that even remotely resembles anything like a fixed wing.
I am supposed to circle back next week with him though.
Gyrocopters have been around longer than helicopters. You'd think that by now the FAA would have a clear picture of what is safest for operating in the same airspace as much larger, faster, and unstoppable aircraft like a Gulfstream or a Citation, wouldn't you? I mean, Amelia Earhart landed her Pitcairn at this airport in the 1930's. It's about time the FAA clearly assigned specific rules and regs written for gyrocopters that fit this growing segment of air traffic, once and for all. And that should include keeping us out of the way of FW traffic by letting us sensibly use the taxiways for air taxiing, take-offs and landings when the taxiway is clear.
I had always preferred the term gyroplane until now. After reading the previous comments above I have come to realize this term is actually detrimental to our cause with the FAA and their mindset regarding our unique aircraft.
Gyrocopter pilots of America unite!