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December - 2004 During the second week in December, Jeffrey P. Fegan of DFW Airport sent the following letter to other airports directors around the country. December 9, 2004 Dear Airport Director: Last month, Gary Kelly, CEO of Southwest Airlines, announced that he believed the Wright Amendment was anti-competitive and outdated. He went on to state that Southwest is no longer "passionately neutral" about the Wright Amendment; to the contrary, he believes it should be repealed to allow Southwest to compete for long-haul traffic out of Love Field. I urge you not to become party to any effort to repeal the Wright Amendment. By way of background, the Wright Amendment was agreed to by the city of Dallas, the city of Fort Worth, DFW Airport, Southwest Airlines and other constituent groups in and around Love Field. Although Southwest Airlines has benefited greatly from the Wright Amendment, it now wants to seek its repeal in order to protect its monopoly at Love Field. If the Wright Amendment is successfully repealed, it will have a detrimental impact upon DFW Airport, its carriers and the North Texas Region. As you may or may not know, DFW Airport just completed the financing of a $2.7 billion capital development program through the issuance of new debt, which increased DFW's debt load six fold. In addition, in September, Delta Air Lines announced its plan to eliminate its DFW hub by February 1, reducing its daily operations from 254 to 21 and effectively abandoning 24 gates at DFW. An economic impact study released by the University of North Texas earlier this month shows that the DFW Metroplex will sustain a nearly $800 million economic loss as a result of Delta's decision to eliminate its hub. Delta's decision will cost the regional economy more than 7,000 jobs paying more than $344 million in annual wages, salaries and benefits. Property income from rents, dividends and other sources will decrease by $143 million each year. State and local governments, including the cities of Dallas and Fort Worth, are expected to lose approximately $58 million per year in tax revenues. All of these figures will be exacerbated if the Wright Amendment is repealed. Obviously, any changes to the Wright Amendment, which could siphon traffic from DFW to Love Field, would have a detrimental impact upon DFW and its carriers at a time when they are least equipped to handle such a major change. Equally disconcerting is the fact that this announcement by Southwest could have, and already has had, a chilling effect on DFW's efforts to bring a low-cost carrier to DFW Airport. Nonetheless, DFW remains committed to backfilling these gates with a low-cost carrier. Prior to Mr. Kelly's announcement, DFW had been courting Southwest Airlines in an effort to have Southwest serve the cities to be abandoned by Delta. Instead of picking up these flights at DFW, Southwest has chosen the most caustic, divisive option by choosing to repeal the Wright Amendment and provide that service from Love Field. Mr. Kelly and Southwest Airlines plan to seek repeal of the Wright Amendment during the next Congressional session, which begins in January. As with many other issues, I believe that this is a local issue that should be resolved locally. As I would never seek to alter how your airport is operated or managed, I respectfully ask that you resist any efforts to involve your airport in the repeal of the Wright Amendment. Retaining the Wright Amendment means a stronger, more diversified DFW, with more carriers offering lower fares to a larger passenger base. Therefore, if you are contacted, I would suggest that you let Southwest Airlines know that you would like to have the airline serve your city, if that is the case, but that you would like to see Southwest provide that service from DFW Airport, not Love Field, as originally agreed to by all parties. Thank you for your consideration. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to call me. Sincerely, Jeffrey P. Fegan Chief Executive Officer Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport The president of Nashville's airport authority, Raul Regalado, replied in a letter that he could not support the "continued and individual protection" of D/FW and American, adding: To put it bluntly, the continuation of the Wright Amendment is not just a 'local matter', but negatively impacts other airports across the country, i.e., is unjustly discriminatory, is anticompetitive, and interferes with interstate commerce" Louis Miller, Tampa's airport director also weighed in. "What I have to do is what is in the best interest of our community, and that is to get as many nonstop markets as we can get, and to get as much low fare service as possible," In a later article published by The St. Petersburg Times Miller said "It's as if we had asked Congress to put restrictions on St. Petersburg - Clearwater International Airport to protect us from the competition, Love Field is the only airport in the country with federal restrictions designed to help another airport." The best comment from the general public was someone who posted on a message board: If I were the recipient of one of the DFW "butt out" letters, here's how I'd be tempted to reply: February 9, 2005 Dear Mr. Fegan: Last time I was in Las Vegas, a man came up to me in the hotel lobby. At the roulette wheel, he bet his life savings on black. Unfortunately, the ball landed on red. He asked for my sympathy and spare change. I was only able to satisfy one of his requests. I have an airport to run. I and our airport board are responsible to our region and its needs. This mandate does not extend to bailing out an airport in another state just because they gambled on increased air traffic and lost. Enclosed please find the world's smallest violin, on which you may play "My Heart Bleeds For You".
Sincerely, Incidentally, by telling the other airports to not get involved in a matter that had the potential to affect air traffic to their respective airports, Jeffrey P. Fegan was indeed seeking to alter how other airports were operated or managed. It was looking more and more like The Boys might be getting nervous about convincing everyone else around the country that this was still just a "local issue." |
| DFW's Letter
Tune - The Letter
No longer neutral -
They don't care how many
Well, he wrote 'em a letter
To every major airport
Well, he wrote 'em a letter
Gettin' rid of Wright's (to)
Cleveland, Hartford, L.A. Boston |
| This site was started by an Austin flyer and is dedicated to North Texas residents and employees of Love Field and Southwest Airlines who are working hard to get this law repealed. This site is not affiliated with Southwest Airlines, Dallas Love Field or the City of Dallas.
For more information on the Wright Amendment and to find out how you can help, please visit the following websites.
 
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