Problems with ATC for decent/landing

OK first it looks like your flying VFR. What you need is IFR.

When you boot FS goto create a flight & click on flight planner. Put your departing airpoirt in and your arriving airport. Click on IFR and click on the bottom right buttom (not ok at the very bottom but the one above it)

Click ok and go and fly. Know you should have ATC contact through out and the clearance part as well.

Tell us how you got on. All the best Liono

Lionohit the nail on the head
👍

When flying IFR,ATC will tell you what runway to expect from about 50/100 miles (depending on your alt)
ATC will also trll you when to start your decent(thou the default ATC likes to have you way too low for finals)

VFR is still a legitimate form of flight, and requires ATC just as much as IFR =).

No you're not doing anything wrong. I think the rule of thumb is that nav equipment broadcast range is about 40 miles, and i'm not sure about ATC, but that also has to do with where you are, interference, how high you are, all that stuff.

One thing that may help is on your list of nearest airports, hitting the '9' key at the bottom of the list will usually bring up further airports, so now you'll be on their radar sooner than later.

A good tip to figure out what runway you should expect is hit 'Shift + z' a couple of times until you see the wind speed/direction. Look at the airports runways and you'll probably be heading into a runway that's reasonably head on into the wind (obviously FS doens't always do this), and if there's an L/R runway, you'll be cleared for the one you're closer to.

I hope this works!

I agree VFR is a legitmate form of flight but I disagree that it requires ATC just as much as IFR. In the USA, it is perfectly legal to fly several hundred miles VFR and never talk to ATC once so long as you do not take off or land at a towered airport and you do not transit controlled airspace that requires ATC communication. That may be fairly difficult to do in the northeast US because of its high density, however, here in the west, it is quite common. I can take off from Mesquite, fly all the way to southern California, and land legally without once talking to ATC.

In the real world, even if you are using ATC for flight following on a VFR flight, ATC will not assign you an altitude nor will they give you instructions to initiate descent. VFR means the pilot in command is responsible for all the decisions effecting his/her flight. Flight following is provided as a courtesy on a workload permitting basis by ATC and they will often not have the time to even call conflicting traffic for you. In VFR, the pilots are solely responsible for "see and avoid" and for all the other issues impacting their flights, including where and when to begin their descent.