Repeal of Wright Amendment Could Expand Flights to Manchester
WASHINGTON, Nov. 10 – A Senate subcommittee considered Thursday if lifting restrictions on airline traffic from Love Field in Dallas, Texas, would promote competition and result in lower prices and better service for consumers.
At issue was a 1979 law, commonly called the Wright Amendment, which limited non-stop airline traffic from Love Field to points in Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma and New Mexico.
“The 26-year-old Wright Amendment has outlived its usefulness and has no place in federal aviation law in the future,” Sen. Kit Bond (R- Mo.) said.
With the passage of the Shelby Amendment in 1997, airlines operating out of Love Field were allowed to expand operations with flights to and from Alabama, Kansas and Mississippi. If repealed, airlines would be allowed to offer non-stop flights to and from all airports in the United States, including Manchester Airport.
Prior to the amendments, and before Southwest Airlines offered service in Texas, all airlines agreed to move their flights from Love Field to Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport. After the transition took place, Love Field, which is about 10 miles from Dallas/Fort Worth, and other local airports were to close. But Southwest did not sign the agreement and began operating out of Love Field in 1971. Southwest is the primary airline at Love Field, accounting for 97 percent of the flights in and out of the airport.
After a lengthy legal battle, Southwest Airlines and the airlines at Dallas/Forth Worth agreed to the Wright Amendment, which requires all commercial flights from Love Field to touch down at an airport in one of the designated states, unload passengers and re-board before continuing on to states further away.
Explaining that he believes the Wright Amendment has “outlived its usefulness,” Sen. John Ensign (R-Nevada) said repealing it and allowing airlines to offer non-stop flights from Love Field to other airports would result in “better deals at better prices and better service.”
As a member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation and the subcommittee on aviation, which sponsored Thursday’s hearing, Ensign introduced legislation in the Senate this summer calling for the repeal of the Wright Amendment.
Though he was not at the hearing, New Hampshire Sen. John Sununu, who also serves on the subcommittee, has co-sponsored Ensign’s legislation.
“Fair, open markets deliver benefits to consumers in the form of low prices and maximum efficiency,” Sununu said in a press release this week. “Airline carriers should operate within the demands of the marketplace.”
Officials from Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport and American Airlines, which is responsible for 82 percent of flights into and out of there, said they believe repealing the Wright Amendment will hurt airlines at the airport, which is also known as DFW.
“Southwest refuses to compete with every other carrier at DFW,” said Kevin Cox, chief operating officer and senior executive vice president of Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, adding that his airport has offered Southwest a year of free rent, valued at $22 million, which would allow the airline to offer flights to all states, promote competition and benefit consumers.
Herbert Kelleher, executive chairman of Southwest Airlines, said repealing the Wright Amendment would allow 3.7 million more passengers to travel, increasing travelers at both airports, and saving consumers about $700 million annually in lower ticket costs. Overall, he said, it would boost the economy by about $4 billion each year.
“DFW has gotten so big that I’m surprised it hasn’t been implicated of a steroid scandal,” Kelleher said.
Despite concerns from Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) that the Wright Amendment is “a very complicated issue” that should be dealt with at the local and state level, some members of Congress believe that since the amendment was passed in Washington, it should be repealed here as well.
“The Wright Amendment stifles options for travelers headed to Dallas’s Love Field, including many New Hampshire passengers who fly from Manchester,” Sununu said. “Removal of this out-dated provision is long overdue.”
