U.S. to Auction Slots Soon at New York City Airports

Tabnabs

By MATTHEW L. WALD and KEN BELSON
Published: December 4, 2008

WASHINGTON — Amid a chorus of objections, the Bush administration is moving full speed toward auctioning landing slots at Kennedy, La Guardia and Newark Liberty airports.

The Transportation Department held a three-hour meeting on Thursday with about 80 airline executives and lawyers to explain how it would determine how many slots would be taken from current users and put up for auction. On Friday, about the same number of people are to attend a seminar on how to bid.

The administration describes the auction as a way to use market principles — mainly money — to ration a scarce commodity, the right to land in the New York area. It has already capped operations at all three airports, in an effort to reduce delays.

But the airlines, which are asserting that they own the slots in question, hate the idea of an auction.

Delta said in a statement: “The last thing the administration should do in its final days — especially in light of the flagging economy — is inconvenience passengers who have already booked flights, raise their fares, threaten jobs, and undermine the hundreds of millions in investments airlines have made in the New York-area market.”

Sarah Echols, a Transportation Department spokeswoman, said the flight caps combined with auctions would “reduce congestion, keep air fares competitive and increase travel options in the New York aviation market.”

The auctions, she said, would protect “the vast majority of flights by incumbent carriers.”

The auction is scheduled for next Friday, with results announced soon afterward; the changes are to take effect at La Guardia in March and at Kennedy and Newark in October.

If the auction is not overturned by the courts or Congress — and either seems possible — it could be the last significant transportation action of the Bush administration, which leaves on Jan. 20.

What is being auctioned is the right to land, or take off, within a half-hour period for 10 years. The reserve price — below which the slot will not be sold — is $10,000 for peak hours and $100 for off-peak, but the president of the auction company, Lawrence M. Ausubel of Power Auctions, said that those numbers were likely to be “well exceeded.”

Mr. Ausubel said he did not know of any prior auction of airport slots.

Matthew L. Wald reported from Washington and Ken Belson from New York.
A version of this article appeared in print on December 5, 2008, on page A32 of the New York edition.

Run_to_da_hills

No doubt O'Leary has his eye on this one.

Our man in Havana

For sure.