"Teacherjh" wrote in message
...

I don't know. But suppose I did (and suppose the answer
were 30nm). I'd need to look at my airport of intended landing
(no (R)) and then every airport within 30 nm (probably only the
towered ones though) looking for the (R) symbol to see if there
was a radar unit close enough to my intended.


Well, if the R is used to indicate the presence of ASR that means there's no
Class B or C airspace or a TRSA, which means you're in a fairly low
population area. Such areas don't tend to have a lot of towered fields so
there wouldn't be too many to examine for the R. I don't see a problem.



Then I'd have to guess or assume that my intended would be
covered by this distant radar (terrain may prevent this), or I'd have
to go looking in some publication (A/FD) to see if there were such
a limitation.


Thirty miles is distant? That's about half the nominal range of ASR.



By putting it at every airport which had (specific) radar services,
no matter where the radar unit itself is located.


What specific radar services are you talking about? I thought we were
talking about traffic advisories to VFR aircraft. What if I'm not landing
at any of those airports? What do all of those Rs do for me then?



At least this would make it more useful to pilots in the cockpit,
where leisure is at a premium.


I find most of my VFR cross country flights to be quite leisurely. I don't
see how putting an R at every airport within range of the ASR does anything
other than put a lot of Rs on the sectional. If you know where the ASR is
located, and you have a rudimentary knowledge of radar, then you have a good
idea where radar services are available.



Actually, I've never used those symbols myself, and am not sure
what "services" I'd request from their hosts.


You'd be requesting traffic advisories.



However, I suspect that ASR approaches would be available there
(or, more accurately, would be unavailable elsewhere outside
ARSA, C & D).


Not necessarily, many locations that have ASR do not provide surveillance
approaches. Locations that do are found in section N of the TPP.



This is useful to know should all the gauges go in the poop
at the same time I hit the soup VFR, but a U-turn would be better.


You shouldn't hit the soup VFR.



Now, the symbol I find least useful is the C in a circle (indicating
that the frequency shown for the airport is a CTAF. I mean,
aren't most of them?
(probably all of them)


If CTAF was well understood the C symbol wouldn't have been created.
Probably the most common error was using the Unicom frequency for advisories
at locations with part-time towers. Now you'll find the C symbol following
the tower frequency at those locations.