EMB ERJ 145 ER/LR
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Workload; Training / Qualification; Human-Machine Interface
ATC Issue All Types; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
General None Reported / Taken
Human Factors; Procedure; Aircraft
KIDDZ 1 arrival is new and very high pilot workload. The Controller was chewing out several guys who weren't exactly on the 'descend via the STAR.' This arrival takes full concentration and if there were weather or other issues to deal with; it would be too much. Various step downs in very short distances with a few different speeds makes what I feel to be too much work load unless you have a modern plane with avionics that will do all the VNAV automatically for you. We never busted anything; but were both astonished at the amount of work this arrival took. We felt like we were in a sim ride. Ask FAA to rewrite these arrivals to be less workload for the pilots for safety sake.
EMB145 Captain believes that the KIDDZ 1 arrival HOU is too demanding for pilots of older technology aircraft such as his.