[Silveredwings]

It's no accident that AA planes' livery is bare skin with a stripe down the side. That much paint weighs literally hundreds of pounds.

Big iron flies almost exclusively at and above flight level 180 (18,000 feet), where IFR is required (including following airways). One of the reasons for religiously flying the airways is that the redundancy of the system. Even if ATC and all ground radar goes down or if the plane loses radio and/or transponders, traffic will still maintain minimum separation. Contrast that to South America where the radar coverage is spotty and pilots aren't so 'religious.' It's like the wild west down there and planes occasionally have mid-airs.

However we eventually update our antiquated system, it will have to account for newer and more efficient procedures that don't sacrifice safety.