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A fight over a Texas airport could threaten American Airlines service between Dallas and the Quad-Cities, a congressional official said Wednesday.
Southwest Airlines and its congressional allies are working to overturn a 1979 law that limits traffic out of 88-year-old Love Field in Dallas. American Airlines opposes the move, and it has an ally in U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa. A Harkin spokesperson said the senator got involved because lifting the limits would jeopardize American's flights to smaller markets such as the Quad-Cities, Des Moines and Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
"There's a very good probability they'd have to eliminate those flights, or at least one of them," Harkin aide Maureen Knightly said.
Critics of the so-called Wright Amendment say it is anti-competitive and anti-consumer. Named after its author, former House Speaker Jim Wright, a Texas congressman, the law permits air service out of Love Field to Texas and a handful of other states. It was aimed at protecting Dallas/Fort Worth Airport, which opened in 1974, but critics now say that kind of government protection is no longer needed.
However, backers of the amendment say the measure does not limit competition at all, but merely protects the public investments made at Dallas/Fort Worth Airport. They add that Southwest can always operate out of Dallas/Fort Worth and say their ability to operate at Love would be severely limited.
Last week, U.S. Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., introduced legislation to scuttle the Wright Amendment with the backing of fellow U.S. Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Joe Lieberman, D-Conn.
In response, Harkin and U.S. Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., introduced a measure that would ban passenger traffic at Love. "Sen. Harkin wants to protect Iowa flights," Knightly said.
An American spokesman, Tim Wagner, would not speculate on what might happen to Quad-City service if the Wright Amendment is scuttled. But he said the company would be forced to shift some of its flights to Love to compete, which likely would cut its number of flights overall.
"It's like pulling that string on a sweater," he said.
Bruce Carter, the aviation director at the Quad-City airport, backs American's position, but he seemed skeptical that Quad-Cities-to-Dallas service would end.
"If they lift the Wright Amendment, I don't know why American would say they would not run into our places because we have good traffic," he said. He added that occupancy on the flight to Dallas tops 90 percent.
Ed Stewart, a spokesman for Southwest, called American's stand a scare tactic. He said it would not make financial sense for the airline to split its operation. "It's what we call scare tactic 101," he added.
The American flight from the Quad-Cities to Dallas began June 9. A second flight is slated to take off Aug. 1. The second flight was added only two weeks after the first one began because of the immense popularity of the initial one, which almost was booked full when the service began.
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