Details:

Corporate Creators:
United States. Interdepartmental Task Force on the Wright Amendment
Subject/TRT Terms:
[+]
Aviation Law Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport--Law And Legislation Dallas Love Field--Law And Legislation Meacham Field (Fort Worth, Tex.)--Law And Legislation Wright Amendment
Resource Type:
Tech Report
Geographical Coverage:
Dallas (Texas)
Corporate Publisher:
United States. Department of Transportation
Abstract:
Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) opened in 1974. To ensure its success

and to provide assurance that the airport could meet its bond obligations, the cities of Dallas and

Fort Worth agreed to move commercial passenger carrier operations from Love Field (DAL)

in Dallas and Meacham Field in Fort Worth to Dallas-Fort Worth Airport. At the time, most

of the major carriers serving the area signed an agreement to transfer. Only Southwest Airlines

-- then a small, intrastate carrier -- did not sign. The courts subsequently found it eligible to

continue to provide intrastate service from Love Field. Concern arose that other carriers might

seek to enter Love Field an provide expanded service, a move which might dilute the service

and financial standing of Dallas-Fort Worth Airport. The legislative result of that concern was

the Wright Amendment -- a provision contained in the International Air Transponarion

Competition Act of 1979 and signed into law in 1980 that expressly prohibits air service

(including connecting and through-ticketing) between Dallas Love Field and points beyond states

contiguous to Texas, including Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, and Oklahoma (See Figure

1.1).

Since passage, two views of the impact of the Amendment have developed. Advocates

of change to the Wright Amendment are concerned that the Amendment's restrictions limit the

benefits of Southwest's lower fare structure as well as the potential economic contribution of the

airport. As a result, residents outside the Wright Amendment area, as well as some residents

of Dallas, have argued for changes to the Amendment in order to allow Southwest to expand its

operations and provide low-fare service to more cities. Opponents to changing the current

restrictions believe that removing or changing the current restrictions would violate the original

agreements that supported construction of Dallas-Fort Worth Airport, divert traffic from the

airport, thus weakening justification for plans to expand, and would lead to major capacity

problems.

To date, proposed Congressional legislation and legal challenges to repeal the Wright

Amendment have failed. Legal attempts to challenge the constitutionality of the Amendment are

currently underway.

The controversial nature of the Wright Amendment led to the creation of a U.S.

Department of Transportation (DOT) team to conduct a study of the issues that surround the

Wright Amendment. This team included members from the Office of the Secretary, Federal

Aviation Administration, Federal Highway Administration, and Urban Mass Transit

Administration (now the Federal Transit Administration). Contractors (Apogee Research and

Howard Needles Tammen and Bergendoff) provided technical support. This study does not

make any recommendations; instead it evaluates five scenarios and measures the potential effects

of each scenario on a variety of issues.


Format:
PDF
Collection(s):
US Transportation Collection
Main Document Checksum:
[+]
urn:sha256:d2b28231faa7528a246f4e53b585a31773912ee1e6d995df18dcefba15f072d8
Download URL:
https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/17018/dot_17018_DS1.pdf
File Type:

Supporting Files

• No Additional Files

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