Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Flying to NYC? Get Ready to Pay More.
The announcement finally came down today from the FAA. Get ready to pay more to fly to New York? This isn't the start of re-regulation of pricing and airlines by the federal government, but instead the beginning of traffic caps at the New York airports in an effort to reduce delays at JFK, LaGuardia and Newark airports. The three airports most responsible for traffic delays across the country.
Last summer, almost 100 planes an hour were scheduled to take off from JFK airport. Starting March 15, the FAA will only slot 82 or so every hour many news agencies are reporting today. Exactly what will this mean for the average traveler? It's still a little unclear, but it seems to point to only being late 40% of the time instead of 50% of the time and paying more for the privilege.
In my relatively uneducated opinion, this points to affecting JetBlue and Delta the most, as these two carriers represent the largest share of traffic from the airport and will probably be asked to make the most concessions among all the airlines affected. Least affected will probably be international routings, as these flights are more profitable, and JFK is considered more of an international hub of the three airports in the NY Metro area.
Personally, I think this flight cap (which is only scheduled to last through 2009) is probably a good idea, but executed poorly. Instead of capping just flight departures, the FAA ought to also create seat minimums for flights leaving during peak travel times, particularly 4pm-9pm when the domestic departures are sharing the bulk of its traffic with the overseas rush. If the FAA insisted on a 100 seat minimum for flights in this time, the number of seats going in and out of JFK may actually increase, keeping prices relatively stable as well. (This would affect mostly American and Delta who fly lots and lots of regional jets in and out of JFK.) Unfortunately, this probably won't be a priority for either the government or the affected airlines.
So the end result, fewer flights, slightly fewer delays, and higher prices.
