Posted on 05/30/2005 7:33:29 PM PDT by Paleo Conservative
So how much runway is required for a 747-100 or 200 to fly 3200 and 8000 miles. The longest runway at Love Field is about 8800 feet.
BTW, have a nice Brannif "flying pumpkin" 747SP sitting on my desk.
Well, didn't know the runway was that long, figured it was shorter, but still, LUV ain't gonna cut it, no connections, just Southwest's stuff, and they don't interline bags or code share.
DFW or IAH has much better facilities, you won't see international stuff at LUV if the Wright amendment goes down.
What an excellent, well thought out reply. A superb example of what has kept me on FR for so long.
I never got to see the Braniff SP, but I did see an SP at HNL in 1978. I did however get to see the Concorde they flew for British Airways in 1979 from DFW to IAD parked at a Braniff gate. It was a beautiful plane, but it did nothing to improve Braniff's finances. Supposedly it was possible to save at least an hour traveling from downtown Dallas to the US Capitol by flying the Concorde just below Mach 1. They had VIP service so all a passenger on that flight had to do was to show up at the terminal and his baggage would be taken by a porter, the car parked, and he could go directly to the gate.
I had a chance, as an airline employee to fly Concorde from JFK to LHR for about $800, but at the time, I didn't have the dough. Our plane used to park one gate away from the Concorde at JFK. Closest I ever got to it was at the Air and Space annex at Dulles.
I did reroute a trip home from S. Africa through Europe, just to fly the SP, I went from Capetown to Joburg to Frankfurt on the SP, it was cool.
Delta airlines has left 50 gates empty and the new international terminal is very large and very close to the old Delta gates. DFW have have some real estate that makes this a good deal for an airline.
I don't see why it would be a problem. AA wouldn't HAVE to offer service there. I guess the model I look at is Chicago - Midway appears to be functioning very well and, AFAIK, is not really an international airport.
Chicago is over twice as populous. DFW is only 11 miles from DAL while Midway is on the other side of downtown from O'Hare. If AA doesn't add more flights to Love in the event of the Wright Amendment being repealed, Southwest will capture more of the traffic to Dallas by expanding the number of flights they operate there. I really don't see why an airline that does not own the airport from which it is flying should be in any position to dictate to the local government that does actually own the airport wheter they must be allowed to that airport. That's a bit like welfare recipients living in government owned housing being able to prevent a city from selling off land with public housing to developers who might tear it down and build something more valuable. You should also consider that if air travel increases at DAL, it will cause more congestion on I-35E and North Central Expressway especially during rush hour. How many billions of dollars would the state have to spend to alleviate that congestion? DFW has better freeway access and the freeways that feed it are more easily expandable.
If Soutwest Airlines wants to fly past the limits of the Wright amendment, I think they should move to DFW where they could have a larger terminal than they currently have at DAL all to themselve or they could let their code share partner ATA have a few of the gates if they think a whole terminal is too big for them.
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