I have never, ever understood why the Wright Amendment is still in place. Did I misunderstand, or wasn't it to be just a temporary thing to protect the business of airlines that decided to move to the then-fledgeling DFW?

I think DFW's place in America's commercial aviation world is pretty safe now, and this out-moded legislation needs to go away FAST. Let competition reign!!

Because AA would just lower their fares and give out ridiculous amounts of bonus miles on JetBlue routes until they left.

That's assuming JetBlue would go after the AA market, which I think they would not. They would probably target other airlines who would have thier passengers hub from DFW into another airport to get into NY.

Think outside of the box guy. :)

The AA and WN boards can probably tell you more, but the short answer is that when DFW was built, airlines regulated by the pre-1978 federal regulation system were required to sign an agreement to move there and leave Love. Southwest wasn't regulated by the feds, because they only flew within Texas at the time, so couldn't be coerced that way.

When regulation ended in 1978, Southwest started flying outside Texas, and AA (and the City of Fort Worth, I think) cried foul. It turned out the only way to stop Southwest was an act of Congress, and so they somehow persuaded Jim Wright, who was the speaker of the House at the time, to get one passed. Over time, the Wright Amendment has been relaxed in various ways, but that's how it started.

That may be a gross oversimplification, of course. Wikipedia, as always, has more information.

Those flights used special premium configured Fokker 100s with 56 seats. The Wright Ammendement states that if a plane has 56 seats or less, than the restrictions do not apply. Hence, AA flew DAL-LAX/ORD/LGA/DCA with 56-seat Fokkers, while Continental Airlines and Delta Connection have flown to CLE and ATL, respectively, in the past using regional jets.

I would love to see jetblue enter the milwaukee market. (or even Appleton which has only regionals) Currently only ATA, Northwest, and Midwest have mainline jets in mke now (there might be one more). United, US Airways, Delta, Continental, AA all run regionals to their respective hubs. It may persuade additional mainlines to show up.

I don't see how JetBlue would NOT, no matter how unintentional, go after the AA market if they got into DFW, American's base of operation. The question was why JetBlue would not try to operate out of both airports. I was simply giving a reason why they would not go to DFW.

Intresting... When I clicked on DEN routes with connections a line shows up between Orlando and Buffalo....Hmmm..

In the past, when this has happened, it will disappear for a while then come back as a new route. It makes sense, with their "connecting the dots" idea, and, unlike FLL, they have the room at MCO to expand. They are also starting up the SYR-MCO route in a few months, so this route wouldn't surprise me at all. I believe that Jetblue also has a strong following from the Buffalo/Toronto area.

Agree! I only fly AA if, and only if, jetBlue doesnt go within a reasonable distance from where I need to go... But than again, there are other airlines thats even worst than American which is why I still pick American... But back to the original topic.... umm....I think were gonna start to see alot more connect the dot type thing going... like OAK to LAS, hell, their already going head to head with southwest on some west coast market (BUR - LAS as the most obvious) But maybe STL and be like TWA and connect east-west traffic in St Louis... I'm all about setting up a focus city in STL, just make sense to me.

As a pure hub STL is fantastic. It's geographically central, unlike Chicago, Dallas or Houston. The problem with STL is that there is very little O&D traffic, so STL would only really work as a pure hub.

There is very little real competition as STL has been largely abandoned by AA mainline and is now mainly served by WN.

STL's geographic position and excellent average weather both contributed to TWA's outstanding operational record in its final iteration.

STL had 14.7 million passenger last year and is projected to be over 16 million this year. So STL is not ORD but it has quite a bit more traffic than even some current hubs with other carriers. AA is running 200 flight a day out of STL. WN is somewhere around 67. B6 would do rather well as they have a better coach product than either WN or AA. Other than starting service out of congested ORD-- that is if they can get the gates I think STL is a natural choice-- one that I hope B6 makes soon!! AA does not have the the stranglehold on STL as they do at DFW and STL does not hold a special loyalty to AA as they did TWA. STL is ripe for the picking-- come on B6 we are waiting!! :)

As an unconditional supporter of both TWA and B6 I would love to see B6 come into STL and they may well decide it's worth their while someday.

One clarification about AA, while they may be running 200 flights a day they're still doing a lot of RJ's, so their capacity is fairly low. A lot of AA itineraries connecting through STL involve flying both legs on RJ's; pretty awful.

Question: Do you know how STL's passenger volume compares to the final year of TWA's operation? Just curious.

30.5 million in 2000 at the peak of TWA operations to 13.3 in 2004 after the AA cuts.

I used to fly through STL about 4 times a month on average. And the amazing thing is that of the hundreds of times I flew TWA through STL I was never delayed more than 5 minutes.