Well this is going to have some major impacts on the battle we’re currently seeing at Chicago O’Hare Airport (ORD), between American and United….
In this post:
Chicago O’Hare flights will be reduced by 10% this summer
At the moment, both American and United are adding a lot of capacity in Chicago, and this is part of a battle between the two companies. Both airlines have a hub in Chicago, but United has taken the lead (by far) in recent years, and now American is trying to regain some market share. So in reality, we’re just seeing a lot of capacity dumping in Chicago over the coming months (and a lot of smack talk!).
In light of all of this, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has revealed that it’s planning forced schedule reductions at Chicago O’Hare, which will apply for the IATA summer 2026 season (which goes from late March until late October).
To what extent should we expect flight cuts? Currently there are 3,080 planned peak day operations at the airport in summer, compared to 2,680 peak day operations during the same period last year. The FAA believes that this “increase is significant and would stress the runway, terminal, and air traffic control systems at the airport,” and proposes that instead, 2,800 peak day operations should be the cap.
That means roughly 10% of planned flights at the airport will need to be canceled. During a meeting in early March, the FAA will review the most congested times of day, where the most schedule reductions are needed. They’ll then meet with US carriers to discuss where they could most practically cut their service, before publishing a final decision.
This is good news for American, bad news for United
The whole reason that American and United are now battling so fiercely in Chicago is because of the airport’s gate allocation process. Airlines are allocated gates in the future based on historical usage, so both airlines are now trying to flood the market, so that they don’t lose market share to the other airline.
In theory, this battle between the two airlines is good for consumers, in terms of added capacity leading to lower fares. However, what would’ve been significantly less pleasant is the impact to on-time performance at the airport. Chicago O’Hare can be a bit of a mess on a good day (especially in terms of taxiway congestion), and with such an increase in service, it was going to get bad.
So how do airlines feel about this news? While I haven’t yet seen anything from United, American released the following statement:
American commends Secretary Duffy, Administrator Bedford, and the FAA for taking proactive action to ensure the operational integrity of the airfield and airspace in Chicago. The FAA now has the opportunity to achieve an improved customer experience for passengers traveling from, to, and through Chicago this summer.
Hah, indeed, as you can see, American views this as good news. I think United will feel differently, though:
- This Chicago growth wasn’t going to be profitable for American, especially in the short term; United believed it was a good opportunity to make a weak competitor even weaker, especially given that American is barely profitable
- American just cares about its proportion of flights at the airport compared to United, so I imagine American thinks it may even score an advantage here, when United has to cut more flights (due to its larger size and bigger growth plans)
We’ll see how this process works out, but I definitely think American is more enthusiastic about this than United.
Bottom line
The FAA has announced plans to restrict flights at Chicago O’Hare Airport this upcoming summer, given the amount of capacity that we’ve seen added in recent times, by both American and United. The expectation is that flights will need to be cut by around 10%, bringing them closer to last year’s levels.
Given the gate allocation process in Chicago, this development is definitely better for American than United.
What do you make of the FAA’s plans to cut flights in Chicago?
It’s complicated who wins and loses. United added a late night bank (presumably not a overscheduled time) so probably could keep that full bank.
And then they’ll have to figure out a way to allocate cuts across the peak hours of the day. I suspect United will have a slightly higher cut but it’ll be more even than we think between AA and UA on cuts received.
This is largely Chicago's fault. Their gate allocation scheme is idiotic and incentivizes over-scheduling at ORD.
Hopefully the FAA forces the city to come to the table too.
Good. This may have lowered prices in the short term (although unlikely on most routes since the flights they were adding were short-haul routes with low demand like Grand Rapids) but if United successfully cut AAs gate capacity that means less competition going forward and that's not good for consumers at all