Kay Bailey Hutchison joined Virgin Group chairman Richard Branson, left, Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings, right, and Virgin America chairman Don Carty in a toast to Virgin America's launch of Love Field flights. (Terry Maxon/DMN)
Kay Bailey Hutchison was a U.S. senator from Texas when she carried the federal legislation in 2006 that provided for Monday’s end to the Wright amendment and its prohibition on long-distance nonstop flights from Dallas Love Field.
She was at Monday’s celebrations to mark the opening up of Love Field. So we asked her if she saw the possibility of further loosening of restraints on the Dallas airport, such as the 20-gate limit on the terminal or the ban on nonstop international flights.
Her answer, in brief: No. At least not anytime soon.
“You know, I don’t think it’s in the imminent future at all. I never say never about what the future might hold. But in the near term, no, because the parties made an agreement,” she said.
Hutchison, who left the U.S. Senate in 2013 after 20 years when her last term expired, likened the Love Field/Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport relationship to that of Washington Reagan National Airport and Washington Dulles International Airport. One is the close-in domestic airport with flight limits and the other one the regional international airport.
“Around Reagan, you have the same noise and neighbor issues that we do, somewhat. And you have the need to make sure that Dulles stays strong because if those international airports start to become less competitive, then that affects the economy of the whole region, too,” she said.
She and fellow Texas U.S. Sen. John Cornyn pushed Dallas, Fort Worth, Southwest Airlines, American Airlines and Dallas/Fort Worth Airport to come to an agreement that each could accept to allow more service out of Love Field.
Southwest CEO Gary Kelly had announced in November 2004 that it was time to repeal the 1980 Wright amendment that restricted nonstop or connecting service out of Love Field to a handful of states.
With the pressure from the senators, the five parties agreed to a compromise, announced in June 2006. Then, Sen. Hutchison faced the battle to get it through Congress. It wasn’t easy, she remembered Monday.
“There were those who thought it should be lifted right away. There were those who thought it shouldn’t be lifted at all. There were other factors that came in,” she said.
“I ended up on the last day of the session, when everything was being held up by another senator because her bill hadn’t passed, and I sat on the floor from the beginning of the session until about 4 o’clock in the afternoon because she said I could have one time to bring up the bill to get it through in that last day,” she said.
“I sat and waited and missed every meeting I had, didn’t go to lunch because I knew if we didn’t get it through then and I had to start all over again with a new bill in January that it might not go,” Hutchison said.
There had already been a hurdle in which she had to fight to keep the Senate Judiciary Committee from sidetracking the bill over antitrust issues, after she had already pushed it through the Commerce Committee.
“I just can’t tell you what I had to do to get the Judiciary Committee off the bill, and it was a completely extraneous issue that affected someone else on the Judiciary Committee. So I ended up holding up a bill by the New Hampshire senator because it affected the Vermont senator, until my bill got cleared,” she said.
“You talk about sausage being made…”
The Senate finally passed her Senate Bill 3661, “The Wright Amendment Reform Act of 2006,” on Sept. 29, 2006. The House passed it the same day. It went to President George W. Bush on Oct. 3, 2006. He signed it 10 days later on Oct. 13, 2004.
And eight years later, the final part became law, allowing the nonstop flights to any U.S. destination.
Ah, the good old days, when Republicans had real people in office and not wack jobs.
Or the good old days when archliberal whack job Jim Wright passed the wright amendment and cost consumers billions of dollars. Actually, there are many more archliberal whack jobs like Jim Wright these days. Bat lady Pelosi is just as crazy as Wright was….Idiots!!
Terry you have done some very good reporting this week. “No, because the parties made an agreement.” Compare this with the nervous laughter of Mr. Kelly in the previous story when asked the same question. If you had an agreement with someone that laughed when the agreement was discussed, what would you think?
The common understanding of the term agreement is that the parties give up things and they receive things as part of the process.
SWA agreed that the noise level would be neutral. SWA agreed to restrict night time flying with the Preferred Runway Program. For more than a year since the terminal re-construction, SWA shoved the majority of their flight traffic to the Lemmon Avenue Runway. The impact, far from being neutral, is oppressive. SWA is the #1 violator of flying at night.
SWA representatives come to community meetings make claims and then disappear.
Which brings us back to the word Agreement. I don’t think it means get what you want, laugh at your counter parties, and then ask for more. If we were talking about the counter parties to a bond issue, how do you think laughing at their expectation that you would live up to your interest payments would go?
Maybe time to reflect and make good on agreements.
Love Field, because of the way they built the new terminal doesn’t have room for 35 more gates anymore. They could build out maybe 8-10 gates on the footprint of the old East Concouse / Terminal 1, maybe make it a 30 gate airport. But with the limited parking, and only two runways, 30 gates is about it. Maybe in 6-8 years we see the push for that starting…maybe we see McKinney build out a passenger terminal. Southwest could an another airport within 80 miles per the multi-party agreement…
Love Field, because of the way they built the new terminal doesn’t have room for 35 more gates anymore. They could build out maybe 8-10 gates on the footprint of the old East Concouse / Terminal 1, maybe make it a 30 gate airport. But with the limited parking, and only two runways, 30 gates is about it. Maybe in 6-8 years we see the push for that starting…maybe we see McKinney build out a passenger terminal. Southwest could fly out of another airport within 80 miles after 2025 per the multi-party agreement…
This all reads like weird, revisionist history. The movement to modify the Wright Amendment actually started with other senators and congress members, NOT Kay Bailey Hutchison. In fact, as I recall, the bill to repeal the Wright Amendment garnered well over 100 co-sponsors from both sides of the aisle in both the House and Senate, but KBH refused to take a position publicly, and was rumoured privately to be doing everything she possibly could to derail the effort.
It was only at the last hour that she agreed to sign on to a much watered down bill which contained the gate penalties, artificially jacked up the cost of flying out of Love Field, involved condemning the Legend Airlines terminal (with the owners now in court attempting to obtain compensation), and essentially sealed in a semi-permanent oligopoly.
When she refers to “those who didn’t want it lifted at all” the only ones I can think of that fell into that category were herself, Eddie Bernice Johnson, and the Ft. Worth congressional delegation. In contrast, well over 100 other members of Congress had signed on as co-sponsors for full repeal.
Also, her comments about Reagan Airport imply that it is restricted due to noise issues. That is false, the restrictions at Reagan related to airport capacity issues (which aren’t present at Love Field).
Look at what is was like in the 70′s, American, Delta, Braniff & Southwest !! Where were more than 20 gates then & we survived !
People, the 20 gate limit wasn’t just pulled out of thin-air. That is about what this airport can support, considering they are going to have about 180 departures a day out of here. Compare the emplanement numbers from the year before DFW opened in 1973. 6.6M. That is with 55 gates. Next year Love Field is expect to approach that all-time record with just 20 gates. Where is everyone going to park? Where are all these planes going to land? I think its possible Love Field could grow to possibly 28-30 gates rejoing the East Concourse to the Terminal again, but they will need to build additional parking and tear up runway 18/36 to make the room for everyone. That’s about it people.
Traffic numbers were much lower back then. Load factors were 50%, not 85%. Frequencies were much lower, you didn’t have an airline flying 23 daily departures to Houston. Flying was much more exclusive in the 60s and 70s. They didn’t even have a parking garage back then, just a parking lot, yet they somehow had room for passengers at 55 gates. Now they have a 4 level parking lot that is almost 1/2 mile long, and they are out of space.
The all time record for enplanements at Love Field was 6.6M in 1973, with 55 gates. In 2015, Love Field is expect to go over 6M, and approach the all-time record with just 20 gates. If they go to 30 gates, you are talking 9M enplanements and there is going to have to be a serious improvement program undertaken just to support that.
Ah, good old Kay Bailey.
Some tacky people would recall her husband Ray was the bond attorney for DFW Airport, maybe owned a bunch of them himself.
Another example of “less government intrusion into private affairs” that she mumbled about at every election.
(I guess I punched the sarcasm button somewhere this morning)
The big difference between DCA and DAL that she fails to mention is that DCA has 45 gates (not 20) and one airline doesn’t control 90% of them.
That’s why people need to start voting Libertarian – because we really mean it when we say “less government intrusion into private affairs”. The Republicans say nice things but in the end they always cave. Vote Libertarian.
the lack of competition is classic democrat style politics at its worst
Wonderful summation. American Airlines was the maestro, the politicians played the kazoos.
1st – The preferred runway program is voluntary.
2nd – Construction on the airport taxiways limits the availability of the preferred runway while still maintaining a close to on-time flight schedule. Or there would be extensive delays.
4th – The people living under the Denton Runway are on to your racism to keep the airplanes over the poorer, more “diverse” neighborhoods.
Stop acting like a spoiled brat and realize YOU bought a house next to an airport that has been there since 1917!
Most airports around the country are similar in size and manage to handle way more traffic. Parking…build some garages.
San Diego has one runway with 465 flights and 17 million passengers. If they can handle it, so can Love. Parking can easily be added through new garages.
Hutchinson is a RINO Republican. A real Republican would have pushed to repeal any limits and had the airport officials determine that. But by having an act of congress limit an airport to 20 gates and no international service, shows that she is more a Carter Democrat than a Reagan Republican.
David: Kay Bailey HUTCHISON has done more to bring parties and minds together in resolving such issues than anyone I can think of. She has never been hell bent on shoving her agendas through Congress, rather working with all parties involved in coming to amicable solutions that all parties can live with.. by the way, how do you expect your post to be taken seriously if you cannot even correctly spell the name of the person you’re criticizing?
Or perhaps it could be that Dallas agreed to no passenger service from Love Field as part of the deal to get DFW funded and built and then had to renege on the deal……
Guess you must be an English teacher and never heard of autocorrect on a mobile device.
And by the way, that’s why Bush 1 was a one-term president.
Where are new garages going to be built? There isn’t room near the terminal, since the last available room would have the additional gates. They would have to either be built close to Mockingbird or on Inwood, and this would require shuttle service. Also, like I already stated, there is only room for maybe 8-10 gates on the east side of the terminal. 28-30 gates is a possibility, but that is it
Look at the airport on google maps on then get back to me. I’m saying 28-30 gates tops with the need for additional parking garages and apron space just to support that. This will never be a 55 gate airport again
What’s typically done at most airports is that you charge the highest rates at the close in parking garage then you have parking linked via shuttle bus further away that’s less expensive. Build the economy lots/garages on Mockingbird and hike the prices in the garage. That’s what others do.
There are written agreements not to fly at night. They were written for a reason. I think there were 5 parties that wanted an AGREEMENT.
The construction excuse is more than a year old and just does not work anymore. Your statements about delays are non-sense. Any citizen can watch the flight traffic at night and see that your statements are false. The violations are occurring one after the other with no traffic on the Denton Avenue Runway.
You have no idea what you are talking about. I bought property where the status quo “no increase in noise” was 15% of the traffic on the Lemmon Avenue Runway. That would be what we call a fact.
Your 4th statement is equally ridiculous. Take a look at the mix of the property on the West side of the airport. You will notice the majority of the property is commercial and industrial. That is why the runway mix and the preferred runway program is the status quo. Your argument about where people move applies equally, including the neighborhood on the West side. They moved into a neighborhood with 85% of the flight traffic on the Denton Avenue Runway. That is the tricky thing about logic, once you bring it out it has a funny way of making things clear. I am not going to dignify the inaccurate garbage comment.
I earned every dollar on my own, one billable hour at a time. Stop acting like a pawn for a developer of a 200 million dollar project. When you consult a history book you will find the neighborhoods were
built before the airport. A couple of small changes have occurred to the
flight traffic since the ground breaking. We have an open invitation
for Orville and Wilbur to fly over anytime.
This
is a strange article, because it implies that former Sen. Kay Bailey
Hutchison led the repeal effort. In fact, however, she came to the game
very late.
The Senate co-sponsors of the The American Right to Fly Act (S. 1424) were:
Sen. Brownback, Sam (R-KS)
Sen. Chafee, Lincoln (R-RI)
Sen. Ensign, John (R-NV)- Aviation subcommittee member
Sen. Hagel, Chuck (R-NE)
Sen. Kyl, Jon (R-AZ)
Sen. Lieberman, Joe (D-CT)
Sen. McCain, John (R-AZ) – Aviation subcommittee member
Sen. Roberts, Pat (R-KS)
Sen. Sununu, John E. (R-NH) – Aviation subcommittee member
The corresponding House bill had 45 co-sponsors. Hutchison appeared to be a staunch opponent of repeal, and it was only when it appeared that effort might succeed that she appeared to panic and agree to a compromise.
And the reason that limits exist there is due to capacity constraints, which Love Field doesn’t face. In fact, Hutchison’s measure actually taking the Legend Airlines Terminal without compensation and tearing it down, without any replacement.
What about the rights of the citizens to obtain access to travel options?
That’s what I said, build some parking. But Love Field isn’t going to support much beyond 30 gates. Besides, McKinney will probably build an airport and then you’ll have 3 in DFW.