United Airlines has fired back at the American Airlines lawsuit which seeks to block Chicago from redistributing gates away from American and to United. United’s message came in the form of a letter to employees from airline President Brett Hart, first reported by Live and Let’s Fly.
American Airlines filed a lawsuit to block the City from moving forward with this gate reallocation process and prevent United from being awarded the gates we earned. We unequivocally reject American’s efforts to block the City’s process. In fact, we plan to take steps to protect our interests and utilize these new gates to benefit our customers.
Then he proceeds to unleash his inner Sean Connery from The Untouchables describing “the Chicago Way.”
It’s clear that American has been neglecting Chicago for years and this meritless attempt to stop the City’s process from moving forward is merely a last-ditch effort to compensate for American’s well-documented lack of investment in their customers, O’Hare airport and the Chicago community.
The memo makes two basic points:
- United has been investing in Chicago, while American has neglected Chicago and grown elsewhere
- United offers disproportionately more flights relative to its gates, while American is underutilizing theirs.
Those points are correct as far as they go. But I’d suggest a few other things are relevant.
- The memo ignores the legal basis of American’s lawsuit which is actually quite strong, that Chicago O’Hare gates shouldn’t be redistributed yet based on the terminal lease that’s been signed. And Hart is a lawyer by training, a former corporate general counsel, and used to oversee United’s legal operation.
- United operates 52% of flights at O’Hare and enabling them to grow at the expense of competitors is probably a bad thing for the local market. Competition is good for consumers, and helps keeps fares down.
- American has added significant growth in its schedule since last year’s numbers that United is citing. United is wrong to imply that American is underutilizing the gates that it has based on what is currently in the schedule. In fact, if the gate reallocation goes through, American will have to curtail its flying plans next summer.
United clearly wants to block American Airlines, take its gates, and lock out competition. They want to lock out competition from American in particular given the special competitiveness CEO Scott Kirby has against his old employer (which let him go, anointing Robert Isom as Doug Parker’s successor instead).
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