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TIA officials want Dallas restrictions to end

A 26-year-old law requires people flying Southwest to Dallas to buy two roundtrip tickets and check in twice.

By JEAN HELLER
Published March 4, 2005

TAMPA - The people who run Tampa International Airport are getting behind an effort to repeal a law that makes it more difficult and expensive to fly to Dallas.

The Hillsborough County Aviation Authority voted Thursday to support an effort by discount carrier Southwest Airlines to repeal the Wright Amendment, 26-year-old legislation that puts restrictions on Southwest in order to protect Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport.

Travelers can fly Southwest from Tampa to Dallas but they have to buy two roundtrip tickets, one between Tampa and New Orleans, and one between New Orleans and Dallas. Checked bags must be claimed in New Orleans and rechecked for Dallas.

The only alternative is to pay considerably higher fares on another airline.

It's all the result of the Wright Amendment, passed in 1979 when Southwest, a startup carrier flying out of Love Field near downtown Dallas, resisted efforts to force it to move to the larger Dallas/Fort Worth International. This involved the airline agreeing to some arcane restrictions.

Southwest, now the sixth-largest carrier in the country and the low-fare leader, is trying to get Congress to repeal the law. What that likely would mean for Tampa passengers is the opportunity to find cheaper nonstop fares to Dallas - the 10th largest destination from TIA.

"Flying is enough trouble without buying two roundtrip tickets to one place," said Sean McLean of Chicago, returning home on Southwest from TIA Thursday after a business trip to the bay area. "I fly Southwest every time they're going where I'm going, but I wouldn't put up with that."

The Wright Amendment decreed that aircraft larger than 56 seats could fly from Love Field only to states that shared a border with Texas: Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma and New Mexico. Alabama, Kansas and Mississippi were added in 1997.

Beyond that, the airline could not sell through tickets or check through baggage.

That means nobody can get from Southwest's largest markets to Dallas without the double ticket and bag recheck. Those markets include Tampa, Orlando, Fort Lauderdale, Philadelphia, Baltimore-Washington, New York and Chicago.

"It's as if we had asked Congress to put restrictions on St. Petersburg-Clearwater (International Airport) to protect us from the competition," said Louis Miller, TIA's executive director. "Love Field is the only airport in the country with federal restrictions designed to help another airport."

TIA will not take the lead in an effort to overturn the Wright Amendment, the HCAA board decided. But if a bill to repeal is introduced in Congress, TIA will ask members of Florida's congressional delegation to support it.

Officials with the DFW airport say the solution is simply for Southwest to move to its facility.

Southwest has rebuffed overtures to make that move, including a $22-million incentive package offered to all airlines to fill the 24 gates left empty when Delta Air Lines ended its hub operation at DFW in January. The package includes free rent for a year and other financial incentives.

Alison Hoefler, corporate relations manager for Southwest, said the airline is happy at Love Field.

"Love Field has always been our home," Hoefler said. "Our passengers know Love Field, and we don't want to create confusion (by moving)."

[Last modified March 4, 2005, 00:30:22]