The FAA takes forever to do ANYTHING. They're afraid of technology ("untried, untested, unproven"), they focus-group everything, they put it out for comment, then ignore all the comments and take out all the good stuff and double-down on the bad. Then a new administration comes in and shakes up upper management and the whole process gets set back three years.

The current ATP rule will only change when congressional representatives are flooded with complaints from their constituents that service to their middle of nowhere town suddenly vanished for lack of pilots to fly there.