Again, the MOAs are HUGE! On any given day or time you simply do not need the whole thing to train. I would be more sympathetic to your position if detailed information on date, time, position, altitude, etc, were made available so that I could plan my trip though this SHARED airspace.
Huge to you, but not so huge to a 500-knot fighter or trainer. There are even subdivisions inside many MOAs that are not evident when looking at a sectional or IFR chart. For instance, when I taught in T-38s, our main training MOA in Texas was 70 miles long and about 90 miles wide. That's 6,300 square miles of area. Sounds huge, but it contained no fewer than 9 sections, each of which could contain one to four T-38s. While established in these areas,
we had to keep turning almost constantly in order to remain within the lateral boundaries of our area.
Occupants of this airspace might include students pilots on their very first solo; two-ship or four-ship aerobatic formations; students performing fairly sloppy aerobatic maneuvers; instrument training; navigation training, etc. Above all this was another area for supersonic training, and below it were T-38s returning from low-level missions conducted within 250 miles of the base.
None of these aircraft had radar of any kind, nor traffic collision avoidance gear. (I believe they have some kind of simple TCAS now.)
And that was just the T-38 side of the base. The other planes (T-1, T-37, T-6) had their own activities in other areas.
All this operated on a very flexible schedule that changed by the minute. That's the nature of military flight ops. As the saying goes, "Flexibility is the Key to Air Power."
It's nearly delusional to ask for a detailed activities list, "knowledge of the plans," and a firm schedule for when a MOA will be hot. You're asking for something that simply cannot be provided, even if everyone, civilian and military, had digital datalinks and real-time traffic displays. I don't mean that that training schedules for the military are always classifed, I mean that the nature of military flying often results in climb/descent rates and turn rates that are simply astronomical and way beyond the capabilites of current TCAS or even advanced ATC radars to predict potential traffic conflicts accurately. That's why, when civilian traffic enters a MOA, the military players are often forced to just "knock it off" and wait until you exit.
And think about what 30,000' per minute of vertical speed really means.
If a MOA is hot, you can assume that the whole thing, from floor to ceiling, MIGHT be used at any time. Because it actually might be! When I was based at Holloman AFB in New Mexico, it was not uncommon for us to be at 15,000' AGL one minute and be at less than 1000' AGL just a couple of minutes later. I've also been on a low-level route at 500' AGL and 540 KIAS, and route-aborted up to 25,000' in less than 90 seconds.
Yep, it's shared airspace. You can fly through a MOA legally and without fear of a violation. You can proudly thump your chest and say, "By Golly, it's my right to fly through here and I'm gonna do it."
But just consider that this shared airspace is called a
Military Operating Area, and because of that, it truly is a risker place to fly than the airspace outside it. These days, when I fly airplanes (including high-performance, privately-owned ex-military jets) around the country, I try to avoid MOAs. If I can't, I just exercise my best judgement -- good VFR conditions, radio contact with ATC, eyes on a swivel, expect the unexpected. That's all.
Please listen to the knowledgable people around you who are gently steering you toward a smart attitude about MOAs. Nobody is trying to take away your airspace or your rights. They're just trying to keep everyone involved safe. Seems like a reasonable task, as long as everyone understands what they are talking about.
