If you listened to last week’s episode of The Air Show, you heard me briefly lose my mind about how the government has approached a variety of topics lately. One of the examples I used is the flight cap that was put into Chicago’s O’Hare airport this summer. I didn’t think I’d get so wound up about that, but after learning more about it, it turns out I was wrong. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) really made a mess of this.
I’ve detailed the run-up in capacity at O’Hare here. American has finally decided to put full effort in regrowing O’Hare after ignoring it for years post-pandemic. But United doesn’t want to give up the advantage it had built while American’s mind was elsewhere, so it started adding dozens and dozens of flights of its own. The end result was likely unsustainable even in decent weather. When storms hit? Forget it, this was going to be a nightmare.
To its credit, the FAA made a rare decision to proactively step in instead of waiting for everything to fall apart and then make a move. It convened a conference of airlines to discuss individually what they could do to help reduce capacity and make the airport function better this summer. International airlines were exempt from this, so really, it’s an American and United story.
Over the three days of the conference spread out in March, transcripts show that the FAA was ill-prepared for this discussion. Perhaps my favorite illustration of this is the moving target that is the operational cap. Though FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford had initially said the cap would need to be at about 2,500 operations per day, the FAA showed up to the talks saying the cap would be 2,400. Then in a meeting with United, LaKisha Price who is Acting Vice President of System Operations Services for Air Traffic said “So, we have some wiggle room with the 2,400. I think the Administrator put out less than 2,500.” She then followed that up saying “We want to be somewhere around 24 or 2,450.” After lunch, LaKisha came back saying that they had been “cleared” to raise that to 2,550.
By day two, the cap had changed to a very specific 2,608. Dan Edwards, Associate Administrator of Airports and Acting Assistant Secretary for Aviation and International Affairs, was very firm.
We are not flexible on the total movements. That’s — you’ve got to trust me on that. 2,608, that’s the hard line
But then when the order came out? The “hard line” was not hard at all. Everyone was surprised with an increase up to 2,708. We are just playing games here. But here is where we stand:
Chicago O’Hare Scheduled Daily Operations
Data via Cirium
I pulled this last week, because it shows where the airlines made their adjustments for May to get under the 2,708 red line. But then in June, you can see it’s before cuts have been made by any airline. This, by the way, shows yet another FAA failure. The airlines raced to get their cuts in so they would be ready for the flight cap to start on May 17. But after all the cuts were made? Then the FAA pushed the start back to June 2. I would be absolutely livid if I were an airline trying to function in this mess.
To be clear, both American and United probably were livid, but in the end, American was fine with the ultimate decision to base the cap proportionally on summer 2025 schedules while United was not. That probably explains why American’s meetings were far more boring, the airline simply trying to keep a set proportion of total flights vs United, while United got outwardly angry in the most entertaining way possible. In other words, if you’re going to read the transcripts, read United’s parts first.
Despite the overheated approach to the situation, there is real merit in United’s discontent. The heart of United’s complaint goes back to the Chicago gate allocation process. I have written about this so, so many times. But essentially, at the beginning of the year, airlines can request gates to be reallocated — actually linear gate frontage but that’s just a proxy for gates — based on actual airport operations. The results are finalized in June, and the gates change in hands in October.
The first year this process went into effect was in 2025. In early 2025, United request a reallocation which would have been based on calendar year 2024 operations. United picked up five gates, and American lost four. (Gates can be reconfigured within the linear frontage provided, so that’s an approximate distribution.) We also know that in the months to follow, American and United would each sublease two of Spirit’s gates.
I know, I know this is all old news. But this is why it’s a problem that the FAA opted to go with summer 2025 operations as a baseline for 2026. In summer 2025, United and American were still running an operation based on the gates that they had before the first reallocation. That meant United was physically able to fly less and American was physically able to fly more than after October.
This was the result of a long play by United to gain gates and force American to reduce. American decided to focus elsewhere instead of Chicago during its pandemic rebuild, it miscalculated, and it paid the price. But now, the FAA is erasing all those hard-fought gains by United with this order.
By forcing the airlines to operate the same proportion they had in summer 2025, it takes away United’s ability to use those extra five gates it earned. So when the next reallocation comes around, United will lose more gates because it was given gates it isn’t allowed to fully utilize.
O’Hare % of Operations By Airline
Data via Cirium
The FAA does not care about this. Not even one bit. In the third day of the hearing — which, by the way, you should read entirely because it is the best reading — Dan Edwards says “The gates are a function of… the use and lease agreement with Chicago Airport. I have no control over who has what gates, who operates from what gates.”
That much is true, but FAA should be taking that into account. I know that some of you will say that I sound like an apologist for United’s position, but that’s not it. United really wanted to based the proportion on summer 2026 planned operations. It points to that being precedent in several other cases from Newark to Amsterdam and Bogotá. But I think the frenetic run-up has certainly distorted the reality of the situation, making 2026 a non-starter.
What I think makes the most sense is to take the summer of 2025 and then make adjustments based on the change in gate holdings that happened after that period but will be in effect for summer 2026. But I’m just tilting at windmills here. This isn’t going to change. And undoubtedly American would say that too is cherry-picking a certain moment in time that disadvantages one airline versus another.
In the end, the FAA really created a mess of this whole thing. If I were American I wouldn’t be mad because even though it was a mess, I got what I wanted. But if I were United? Yeah, I’d be pretty mad.
