LaGuardia 'perimeter rule' to go away? Maybe, report says
Flight options may soon expand for passengers using New York's LaGuardia Airport. That's according to The Wall Street Journal, which reports regulators are considering ending the long-standing "perimeter rule" that restricts most LaGuardia flights to 1,500 miles or less.
The newspaper says the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey – the agency that runs the New York City-area airports – is studying the restriction "to determine whether it remains in the best interest of the region's air travelers." The agency adds any change would come only after a broad analysis and consultation "with all interested parties in a public and transparent manner," the Journal writes.
Few U.S. airports are subject to such distance restrictions, though Washington's Reagan National Airport is probably the most notable exception after to LaGuardia. Flights at the D.C. airport are restricted to a 1,250-mile perimeter, though Congress has exempted about two dozen flights from the rule over the past decade.
As for LaGuardia, there already are a few exemptions there, too. Denver flights are exempted, as are flights on Saturday.
Otherwise, routes to markets like Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Las Vegas and Phoenix are generally not possible from LaGuardia. Loosening that rule would make those potentially lucrative routes attractive options for airlines, especially for weekday service that could lure high-spending business travelers.
Currently, LaGuardia passengers can only reach those cities by connecting or by choosing instead to fly from one of New York's two other big airports: Newark or JFK.
"The mix of flights at La Guardia would change materially," Mike Boyd, president of aviation-consulting firm Boyd Group International, says to the Journal. "Why would you have a 50-seat jet going to Charlottesville when that slot can be used for a 150-seat jet going to Seattle?"
The Journal cites unnamed sources in writing that talks on lifting the rule began "late last year and have accelerated recently." The study on doing so could be done "within a few months."
The Journal also speculates that a phase-out of the rule could even open up international routes. LaGuardia does not have customs and border control facilities for passenger flights. But the airport could receive flights from foreign airports where the U.S. runs federal "Pre-Clearance" customs and border control operations. At those airports, U.S. bound-fliers go through customs and border patrol at the pre-clearance facility and then essentially arrive to the U.S. as domestic passengers.
On that note, the Journal points out Delta already flies one weekly round-trip between LaGuardia and Aruba by taking advantage of the Saturday exemption.
Still, at least one U.S. airline executive voiced concern that LaGuardia's notoriously outdated terminals could show even more strain if the perimeter rule were eliminated. Flights on bigger planes to big cities on the West Coast would invariably boost passenger levels at the airport.
"It would seem the last thing we want to do is add more crowds to La Guardia until we appropriately address capacity issues," Rob Land, JetBlue's SVP of government affairs, says to the Journal.
Stay tuned …