United’s terminal at JFK
United Airlines said Tuesday that it will end service at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport come October unless the Federal Aviation Administration grants it additional landing and departure slots.
In a letter to Acting FAA Administrator Billy Nolen last week, United CEO Scott Kirby urged the agency to increase the carrier’s capacity at JFK, according to an e-mail the airline sent to employees on Tuesday that was viewed by Frequent Business Traveler.
“If we are not able to get additional allocations for multiple seasons, we will need to suspend service at JFK, effective at the end of October,” Kirby wrote in the e-mail.
Currently, United operates two daily premium transcon flights to San Francisco and to Los Angeles from JFK, which is once again the busiest airport in the New York metropolitan area.
In a statement last week, the FAA said it “must consider airspace capacity and runway capacity to assess how changes would affect flights at nearby airports. Any additional slots at JFK would follow the FAA’s well-established process of awarding them fairly and to increase competition.”
The Chicago-based carrier ended service from JFK in 2015, moving its premium transcon flights to its hub at Newark Liberty International Airport.
After a five-year absence and at least three delays in its return, United Airlines restarted operations at John F. Kennedy International Airport at the end of March 2021.
“I have been waiting a long time to say this – United Airlines is back at JFK,” Kirby said several months before that. Several years ago, after joining United as president, he had said that leaving JFK had been a mistake for the carrier.
(Photo: Accura Media Group)
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