Flying Rights Transferred In New York, Washington, D.C.

Delta Air Lines and US Airways have finalized their agreement to transfer takeoff and landing rights at New York's LaGuardia and Washington D.C.'s Reagan National airports. The agreement was approved on Oct. 10, 2011, by the U.S. Department of Transportation, which concluded that the transaction is in the public interest because of the service benefits and efficiencies that would result in both New York and Washington, D.C.

"Now that we have closed our agreement with US Airways, we can begin taking steps to expand our schedule at New York-LaGuardia, greatly increasing travel choices for our New York customers and increasing competition in the market," Richard Anderson, Delta's chief executive officer, said Tuesday. "We also look forward to expanding and modernizing our LaGuardia facilities as we create a Delta hub operation at LaGuardia."

"US Airways has been a solid operator for travelers utilizing the easily accessible service at Ronald Reagan National Airport for many years," said US Airways Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Doug Parker. "Our expanded presence at Reagan National enables us to add more frequencies in existing markets so customers have more travel choices; it also allows us to expand our service so more smaller communities have access to non-stop service to this very important market and beyond."

Under the agreement, Delta acquired 132 slot pairs at LaGuardia from US Airways and US Airways acquired from Delta 42 slot pairs at Reagan National, as well as the rights to operate additional daily service to Sao Paulo, Brazil in 2015. In addition, the airlines divested 16 slot pairs at LaGuardia and eight slot pairs at Reagan National to airlines with limited or no service at those airports.

The airlines will separately announce their expanded schedules in New York and Washington, D.C. in the near future.

FMI: www.usairways.com, www.delta.com