In a letter sent Thursday to the Secretary of Transportation, Sens. Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin said, "the clear intent of Congress was to keep the major airlines from gaming the system to the detriment of new entrant airlines specifically and airline competition generally."
The problem is that earlier this week the Federal Aviation Administration proposed a lottery method for determining who will be awarded slots. The FAA's proposal would let major carriers artificially add participants in the lottery through their commuter affiliates. As a result, new entrant carriers will have less opportunity to secure slots and a more difficult time securing competitive slot times.
The FAA's lottery proposal is open for public comment for only one week. In their letter, Harkin and Grassley said the FAA proposal is "completely unacceptable." The senators said they are putting intense pressure on the FAA to recognize the letter and spirit of the law approved by Congress in March and signed by the President in April.
"The lottery system proposed by the FAA totally undermines our effort to help new entrant and low-cost airlines be competitive and financially viable. These airlines can't offer service to travelers without access to LaGuardia Airport in New York. By giving major carriers the chance to continue hoarding all the slots through their commuter affiliates, the FAA is trying to defy the clearly stated will of Congress," Grassley said.
"Senator Grassley and I are very pleased that we successfully changed the law to increase the number of flights at LaGuadia to improve service to cities like Des Moines and to increase competition. Now that LaGuardia may have reached its maximum capacity, the decision of how flights are allocated should be structured to favor that goal as the law provides. Unfortunately, the proposed lottery system gives an unfair advantage to a couple of large carriers and that bias should be eliminated," Harkin said.
Harkin and Grassley's amendment to the airport improvement bill specifically aims to give new entrant carriers an opportunity to get in the slot system that governs take-offs and landings because under the old system major airlines had an enormous advantage over start-up carriers which eroded competition in underserved markets.
Their amendment applies to O'Hare, LaGuardia and Kennedy airports and says that each domestic new entrant or low-cost carrier with fewer than 20 slots at a slot-controlled airport will be immediately eligible to obtain a total of 28 slots. In addition, newly-developed regional jets serving small- and medium-sized airports would be granted exemptions from the slot controls.