"Southwest not wasting any time in Dallas"

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Southwest not wasting any time in Dallas 
By David Koenig
The Associated Press 


DALLAS - Moving quickly to take advantage of a new federal law, Southwest
Airlines Co. says it will sell one-stop flights from Dallas to 28 new cities
at introductory fares starting at $99 each way.
 
The move is virtually certain to trigger a fierce fight between neighboring
airlines - Southwest, the most profitable U.S. carrier, and American
Airlines, the nation's biggest. 

American hinted it would slash prices on flights from nearby Dallas-Fort
Worth International Airport, although American is likely to charge more for
its nonstop flights. 

For 37 years, a federal law called the Wright Amendment limited flights at
Southwest's home base of Dallas Love Field to Texas and a few nearby states.
Southwest served 18 cities in that region. 

Last week, President Bush signed a bill that allows immediate one-stop
flights and, by 2014, unrestricted nonstops. 

Southwest Chief Executive Gary Kelly rushed to announce that beginning
Thursday, Southwest will for the first time sell tickets linking Dallas with
Los Angeles, Chicago, Las Vegas and 22 other cities. It will also sell seats
on partner ATA Airlines' flights to New York's LaGuardia Airport, and
Honolulu and Maui, Hawaii. 

The flights must stop in Texas or a nearby state - a vestige of the Wright
Amendment that Congress wouldn't abolish until 2014. The Hawaii trips will
take two stops. American won't actually add flights; it will merely change
the way they are sold and priced. 

"The days of high fares for North Texas are about to be past," Kelly said.
"In most cases, full coach fares will fall hundreds of dollars each way." 

The $99 tickets must be bought 14 days in advance and cover only a limited
number of seats - Kelly wouldn't say how many on each flight. The airline
said competitors are charging from $116 to $219 for similar tickets. 

American, a unit of Fort Worth-based AMR Corp., operates nonstop service
from DFW to every city on Southwest's list and then some - a total of 126
U.S. cities and 33 foreign destinations. 

American also operates a few flights at Love Field, and will sell connecting
tickets through St. Louis to other cities. 

Kelly suggested the expanded service from Dallas will generate enough new
traffic to bring in $50 million in annual revenue. 

While the new legislation is seen as a boon to Love Field, it may also
benefit San Antonio International Airport, said Barbara Prossen, assistant
to the aviation director. 

She said travelers from San Antonio now have the option of connecting
through Dallas rather than Houston or Phoenix. Flying Southwest through
Dallas has required passengers to buy extra tickets, take their bags off the
plane and recheck them, as the Wright Amendment restricted direct ticketing.


The only drawback, which Prossen said is a remote possibility, is that
Southwest might opt to flow more flights through Dallas than San Antonio.
But she said the airline has good passenger counts through San Antonio so
she doesn't expect that to happen. 

Some passengers at Love Field reacted happily to the prospect of a fare war.


Faye Breeden of Frisco was scanning the arrival board for her
mother-in-law's Southwest flight from Orlando, Fla., via San Antonio. "I had
to buy her two separate tickets to get here," Breeden said. 

Dallas-Orlando is one of the routes on Southwest's one-stop $99 list. 

"We go to Orlando quite often, so this will be great," she said.

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