The Cranky Ol' Bat

Life is a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death! - RuPaul

2005-12-07

Dallas is Feeling the Love.....

Finally, one of the stupidest legacies of any former member of Congress is being slowly struck down. The Wright Amendment restricted travel from Dallas' Love Field to airports either within Texas or states that border Texas. (Maybe if you are old enough, you might remember Rep Wright. He opposed Reagan's tax cuts not on philosophical grounds, but simply because people might spend it at McDonald's....I guess he was getting his campaign money from Burger King. Yup, that mental dwarf. He was responsible for this idiotic travel restriction, too.)

Southwest Airlines has been allowed to fly to Missouri from it's headquarters at Love Field starting this month. Love Field is much closer to downtown Dallas, and it is expected to draw some traffic away from the headache that is DFW, home to American Airlines.

Of course, American Airlines will match the fare, and will open up its dormant gates at Love Field to take on Southwest on its home turf.

Southwest is planning to charge $129 one-way to Kansas City and St Louis from Love Field, with the occasional seat going for $79. American was charging $253-$599 for the same destinations from DFW.

American and DFW are expected to lobby hard to ensure that no other destinations are allowed to join Missouri.

6 Comments:

  • At 4:40 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    It's going to be really interesting to see what happens once American is set up at Love. I wonder if American will offset this by cutting back on local flights from DFW.

     
  • At 7:55 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    American isn't any more likely to make cutbacks at DFW to support flights at Love than it is to make cutbacks in other cities when it is growing its DFW hub.

    American Airlines has added roughly 100 daily departures from DFW in the last 12 months alone without having to make cutbacks anywhere else, so it's hard to see why adding 8 flights from Love Field is going to cause them any great heartburn.

    However, AA is a master at spinning the truth (and just straight-out lying when it serves their purposes), so I would expect them to blame any and all future troubles on the Missouri exemption from the Wright Amendment.

    It would be great if they would just focus, instead, on delivering a quality product at a competitive price instead of relying on Uncle Sam for protection.

     
  • At 12:05 PM, Blogger KoryO said…

    People have been waiting a long time for American to deliver that "quality product." That's not going to happen with the management they have in place.

    I wouldn't bust my tail for that group of clowns, either.

    American's still pissed that they couldn't strangle Southwest from the start. They'd rather do that then maybe learn a trick or two from them and improve. It's much easier for them to blame everyone else for their problems.

    I just hope that maybe some other "exemptions" will be made from the Wright Amendment, and soon.

     
  • At 6:31 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    It is a bit frustrating to watch this fight just drag on and on. I really wish Southwest had simply moved to DFW so they could fly everywhere, then at least we wouldn't have to deal with this long drawn out battle.

     
  • At 8:40 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    It might also be nice if Southwest gave out pony rides to children. Fortunately or unfortunately, Southwest is a business focused on making money. They appear to have determined that they can not make a go of it at DFW Airport.

    Since this isn't the former Soviet Union, we can't "force" Southwest to DFW any more than we can force American Airlines to offer cheap, walk-up fares out of DFW Airport.

    Everywhere else in the U.S., the marketplace, rather than political hacks, sorts these issues out.

    Why not bring the free market to Fort Worth and Dallas?

    Let American continue to charge the highest fares it can get away with at DFW Airport, but give consumers the same rights and privileges they get everywhere else in the U.S.... the right to fly from the one airport of their own choosing (either DFW or Love Field) to any other airport of their own choosing without being subjected to political interference.

     
  • At 10:51 PM, Blogger KoryO said…

    Southwest has often ignored airports for nearby ones that charge them less for the gates (that's why you can fly them to Ft Lauderdale, but the only way they were coming into Miami was as an emergency landing....and a big reason they didn't fly into Denver for a long time.)

    It's just weird that this really is the last vestige of airline regulation that is still in effect today.

     

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