Only 88 flights an hour?
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
For the first time ever O'Hare was not the busiest airport in the world (in either number of passengers, or flights).
See the Chicago Tribune story: http://www.chicagotribune.com/travel/chi-0601040304jan04,1,2028980.story
But that's not necessarily a bad thing. In theory fewer flights should allow for better on time arrival/departure. Ironically even though in 2004 O'Hare was the worst for on-time arrivals I had better experiences in 2004 than in 2005 (I never waited for 2.5 hours for a gate, and then .5 hours for a jet-bridge drive in 2004, as I did in 2005).
Hopefully 2006 is even better. Yay for the FAA caps:
The FAA flight caps at O'Hare have limited domestic arrivals to 88 per hour between 7 a.m. and 8 p.m., down from as many as 120 when the airlines were free to schedule as many flights as they wanted, despite extreme delays.
Under the restrictions, which the FAA has proposed continuing through early 2008 until the first new runway in the O'Hare expansion plan opens, United Airlines and American Airlines agreed to cut flights during peak hours.
A mere 88 flights arriving per hour, that's weak!