Flight Reduction Agreement To Remain In Place An Additional Six
Months
A voluntary airline agreement to reduce flight delays at
Chicago's O'Hare International Airport would be extended another
six months, through the end of October, under a proposal announced
by U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norman Y. Mineta. The
current voluntary agreement with airlines operating into and out of
O'Hare was set to expire April 30.
"The voluntary flight reductions have helped ease the pressure
on travelers and given all of us some breathing room while we work
toward a longer term solution to the capacity challenges at
O'Hare," said Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta.
The Secretary cited recent improvements at O'Hare as the reason
behind extending the scheduling agreement until the end of October.
Secretary Mineta noted, for example, that since last November 1,
2004, average arrival delay minutes at O'Hare dropped 21 percent
and the overall arrival on-time performance rose by an average of
nearly 11 percent.
As delays mounted last year at O'Hare, Mineta convened a meeting
between the FAA and the U.S. and Canadian airlines serving the
airport. The result was a voluntary agreement by each airline to
limit arriving flights at O'Hare during peak hours at the
airport. The agreement's benefits were immediate, Mineta
said. Less than a month after the agreement took effect last
November, on-time arrivals improved by nearly 20 percent while the
average arrival delay dropped by over 40 percent as compared to
November 2003. Overall on-time performance improved again in
December by 8 percent and in January by 6 percent, Mineta
added.
The order signed yesterday by FAA Administrator Marion C. Blakey
proposes to keep the basic elements of the voluntary agreement in
place and also seeks comment on whether and how the agency should
allocate unused capacity assigned to air carriers in the original
order.
"Cooperation works,"
said Blakey. "Our goal is to get the passenger there on time,
and that's what the order supports. The original schedules
called for more planes than the airport could handle. The order
reflecting the carriers' agreement puts an end to a practice that
made delays and missed connections an unavoidable certainty.
By proposing to extend this agreement, we would continue to give
passengers a fighting chance to arrive on time."
Under the order's proposed extension, domestic airlines serving
O'Hare would continue to be limited to 88 scheduled arrivals per
hour between 0700 and 0800 Also, airlines would be
required to contact the FAA for approval prior to rescheduling
flights to ensure potential scheduling moves do not have a
detrimental effect on airport efficiency. To preserve airport
access and competition, the order would allow new entrants and
those carriers already serving O'Hare with fewer than eight
scheduled arrivals to add no more than one arrival from 1200
to 2100. All additions would be subject to prior approval by the
FAA and handled on a first-come, first-served basis.
The extension is expected to serve as an interim measure until
the agency proposes more formal rulemaking to address
congestion-related delays at the airport.