Clinton or congress
US & DL Asset Swap- (All Discussions Merged)
- Thread starter Hope777
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PHX Flyer
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Actually, it was the Ford administration,who initiated the process, and it was Jimmy Carter, who signed the Airline Deregulation Act into law - in 1978 (the year Bill Clinton was elected governor of Arkansas).
We are not talking about deregulation
We are talking about a slot increase at LGA by the government for small communities that was allow with RJ
BoeingBoy
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Both - Congress included the easing of LGA slots for aircraft below 70 seats in the 2000 FAA re-authorization bill which was signed into law by Clinton.
Jim
wings396
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Sad to say, but I believe that it is only because they choose not to do so. At one time both LGA and EWR had plenty of Mainline point-to-point flying.
A short time after the US/PI merger the clowns at the top decided to get away from doing that, and to focus on flights to the hubs only. The passengers are there, but this airline prefers to let them fly on our competitors instead. I can't place full blame on the current management due to the fact that they "inherited" this mentality from the US-East way of operating. When I was at EWR in the 80's, we flew to many cities that bypassed the hubs and the flights were full on a regular basis. When it comes to cities such as EWR, LGA, BOS, and so on you can round up enough passengers to justify flights that don't force everyone thru a hub. If you can get to any destination on a non-stop flight from a major city, it is unlikely that you are going to make a connection in CLT or PHL if you don't have to.
Piedmont Airlines flew 737's form LGA to all the mid-sized cities in the mid-Atlantic. US Air flew DC9's to all the northeast cities, and then the merged companies purchased all the Eastern slots and flew non-stop to all the big Florida cities.
The Government didn't like one airline being that big in LGA. They couldn't just walk in and take the slots and give them to someone else, so they figured the cheapest way to bust it up was to allow a free for all....let the other guys pour all the RJ's in they wanted.
The traveling public and US Air paid the price. 20 years of ATC delays, and a slow dilution of our business to the others, it looks like it worked. The government slowly screwed US Airways. And never had to compensate them for a slot.
If Delta can pull this swap off and get US Airways completely out of LGA they can start adding back the mainline service to the midsized cities that we use to fly.
Walla just like magic, Delta worked long and hard to claim LGA and with a little help from their friends it looks like thay did it!
Congratulation to them!
Dog Wonder
Veteran
Walla, the government protects US Airways from itself.
You may have something there ... if the government would have let HP and US and few others go under a long time ago ... the aviation employees left standing wouldn't have suffered as much ..... but there would have been fewer cheap tickets for consumers had that been allowed
Who sponsored the bill?
And why when the slots were at their max
They wanted kayos .... until US Air would be forced to give up it's LGA dominance. They ='s government (dem & rep, all the same).
For a deregulated industry, the government sure has dictated every single thing this industry has done since 1978? They have really screwed it up, but what haven't they screwed up!
For a deregulated industry, the government sure has dictated every single thing this industry has done since 1978? They have really screwed it up, but what haven't they screwed up!
Your right.....
CO/FL announced their slot swap and transaction 12 hours prior to Randolph being announced last August and did their deal in the spring. I dont remember seeing a DOT/DOJ approval or open comment period with that? ( Their transaction consited of FL pulling out of the EWR market and in exchange received 4 DCA slots and 6 LGA slots from CO )
More recently AA/B6 announced their transaction in the Spring and are already flying the slots and selling seats in non-competitive markets. Once again can anyone find a DOT/DOJ approval or open comment period?
DOUBLE STANDARD or does the goverment want US to fail to reduce capacity?
I looked and could not find any FAA/DOT comment or approval docket for the CO/FL deal. Still, granting a limited access LCC like Airtran a few slots at LGA and DCA in exchange for a few slots at EWR is a far different transaction from the DL/US deal.
Again, I couldn't find any FAA/DOT docket for the AA/B6 deal but this slot swap is completely different from the DL/US deal. The airline holding more JFK slots than any other airline (B6) gave up 12 pairs of JFK slots to AA in exchange for eight pairs of DCA slots (a new market for B6) plus one pair at White Plains. The number of slot pairs is practically inconsequential compared to the number in the DL/US deal.
Neither AA nor B6 acquired more than 50% of the slots at either airport, in contrast to the DL/US deal. The FAA decided that DL would be acquiring a dominant position at LGA and US would be doing the same at DCA. In the AA/B6 deal, AA would be gaining a few slots at JFK (where it is not dominant and where an LCC is the largest airline) and B6 would be gaining entry into DCA. No matter how you slice it, the AA/B6 deal doesn't resemble the allocation of markets that the DL/US deal did. When two competitors decide to trade assets so that each becomes dominant in one market (where both were fairly strong in both markets) and each becomes a bit player in the abandoned market (US at LGA and DL at DCA), that sets off antitrust concerns among government regulators.
My take on it is that the FAA was not impressed with the arrogance displayed by DL and US in rejecting the FAA's proposed remedy (the slot divestitures) and especially the thinly-disguised ploy to prevent WN from bidding on the LGA slots.
EWR may not be Slot Controlled, HOWEVER it is Space Controlled. There are ZERO Gates available for Arilines to Acquire.
Air Tran Agreed with CO to Pull out of EWR for SLOTS at both DCA and LGA. In Return CO got Gate Space ( Gate 11 ) which Air Tran had the contract on.
Wonder WHY Virgin America Cant get into EWR ????
Slot controls were eliminated at ORD, JFK and LGA earlier this decade, but the FAA has re-imposed controls that look like slots due to the ensuing congestion. EWR was not slot controlled in the past (like ORD, JFK, LGA were and DCA still is), but the FAA has recently limited operations at EWR nonetheless. FL gave up 10 "slots" at ERW:
http://atwonline.com/airports-routes/news/report-airtran-continental-agree-dcalgaewr-slot-swap-0309
http://atwonline.com/airports-routes/news/report-airtran-continental-agree-dcalgaewr-slot-swap-0309
