Partial Competition Restored in Dallas-Fort Worth Aviation Market
It should have gone further than it did, and the cited headline is misleading.
From the not very humbly named Meetings Industry Megasite:
Congress Ends Domestic Flight Restrictions at Dallas Love Field
October 04, 2006
Washington, DC — Congress on Friday approved legislation that eliminates restrictions on long-haul domestic flights at Dallas Love Field, the home airport of Southwest Airlines.
The new legislation will increase competition in northern Texas, thus putting downward pressure on air fares, according to Southwest, the nation’s leading low-fare airline. President George Bush is widely expected to sign the bill.
The legislation reflects an agreement in June between Southwest, American Airlines, and the mayors of Dallas and Fort Worth to support changes to the federal Wright Amendment, which had restricted flights at Love Field to a nine-state region in the South and Southwest. The Wright Amendment benefited carriers at nearby Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, where American is the dominant carrier.
The agreement lifts restrictions on non-stop domestic service from Love Field — but after eight years, a concession to American Airlines.
However, Southwest can issue so-called through tickets when the new law is enacted.
….. In another concession to American Airlines, the agreement downsizes Love Field to 20 gates from the current 32 gates, thereby restricting Southwest’s growth at its home airport.
The eight-year wait for national non-stop service is an outrage, but at least in the meantime national direct service is in place at Love. I’m assuming the gate restrictions are based on valid needs for boarding and departure space and do not represent an artificial competitive restriction; if I’m wrong, that’s an outrage too. If Love carriers are smart, they’ll schedule direct long-haul flights with stopovers at small airports to minimize total flight times to final destinations.
There was never any justification for restricting flights out of Love in the first place. The Dallas-Fort Worth airport could have grown just fine without that restricting. In a more competitive environment, DFW might might not have poured so much money into seemingly endless construction projects and a level of sprawl like no other airport I can think of other than Denver (which, not coincidentally, is another airport built to replace a very convenient closer-in facility). DFW today is a horribly inconvenient place where you stand a fair chance of missing your flight if you don’t drop your rental car off a full two hours before your flight’s departure time. That’s ridiculous. Let there be Love.
