BOISE, Idaho (AP) -- The Gulfstreams and Learjets carrying the top brass of the media world into the mountain resort of Sun Valley for an annual business retreat won't be getting the white-glove treatment.
Like ordinary small planes heading in and out of the small airport on some of its busiest days, corporate jets will have to wait in line to use the one runway surrounded by 8,000-foot-high mountains.
The Federal Aviation Administration has decided to scrap restrictions that would have thinned out the number of planes traveling through Friedman Memorial Airport on Tuesday, the retreat's opening day, and July 10, the day after it ends.
''We felt this would be discriminating against a class of pilots, which is against FAA regulations,'' said Kathleen Roy, spokeswoman for the association.
Now in its 23rd year, the gathering of the world's business elite to play bridge, golf, ride horses and haggle over multimillion-dollar deals regularly attracts such luminaries as Oprah Winfrey, Bill Gates, Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch.
But the 405,000-member Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association said the restrictions were intended to accommodate ''bigwigs'' who ''don't appreciate much delay or inconvenience.''
The limits would have restricted the airport during peak hours to pilots authorized to fly using only instruments, rather than by visual navigation. Visual navigation is commonly used by small plane pilots.
Airport manager Rick Baird is furious. He's expecting 600 to 800 takeoffs and landings because the retreat's opening day is also the peak day for departures after the Fourth of July holiday.
''It doesn't take a mathematician to understand we could be overwhelmed,'' Baird said. ''The FAA had supported us in attempting to close to small fliers for a period of time so that we have control over what happens.''
Baird said the pilots' group made ''self-serving, condescending and inaccurate'' claims about the flight restrictions _ and is responding not to a legion of Cessna and Piper pilots, but to a handful of charter pilots who were fearful they wouldn't be able to ferry clients to Sun Valley on short notice.
''This isn't about the little guy, it's about the guy who's hired to fly someone from Las Vegas to Sun Valley on short notice and who wanted to make sure he still got a paycheck,'' Baird said.
The FAA is now requiring all pilots planning to use the Sun Valley airport on Tuesday or July 10 to go online and reserve a takeoff or landing time slot from the FAA's Air Traffic Control System Command Center in Herndon, Va.
