Am. Airlines v. Texas Dept. of Transp.

Decision Date01 February 2000
Docket NumberNo. 99-60239,No. 99-60008,DALLAS-FORT,99-60008,99-60239
Parties(5th Cir. 2000) AMERICAN AIRLINES, INCORPORATED; CITY OF DALLAS, TEXAS; SOUTHWEST AIRLINES COMPANY; LOVE FIELD CITIZENS ACTION COMMITTEE, Petitioners, v. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION, Respondent. THE CITY OF FORT WORTH;WORTH INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT BOARD, Petitioners, v. DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION, Respondent
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

[Copyrighted Material Omitted] Petitions for Review of an Order of the U.S. Department of Transportation

Before DUHE, BARKSDALE, and EMILIO M. GARZA, Circuit Judges.

EMILIO M. GARZA, Circuit Judge:

This consolidated appeal involves respondent Department of Transportation's ("DOT's") interpretation of federal law governing airline service at Love Field airport. Petitioners Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport Board ("DFW Board"), City of Fort Worth ("Fort Worth"), American Airlines, Inc. ("American"), City of Dallas ("Dallas"), Southwest Airlines Company ("Southwest"), and Love Field Citizens Action Committee (the "Committee") petition for review of DOT's declaratory, procedural, and reconsideration orders. Legend Airlines, Inc. ("Legend"), Continental Airlines, Inc. ("Continental") and Continental Express, Inc. ("Continental Express") have intervened. For the reasons set forth below, we affirm.

I

Prior to 1968, Dallas and Fort Worth operated independent and competing airports. One of Dallas's airports was Love Field. DOT's predecessor agency, the Civil Aeronautics Board ("CAB"), found that the competition between Dallas's and Fort Worth's airports was harmful. Accordingly, in 1964 CAB ordered the cities to build a jointly-operated airport that would serve as the region's primary airport. The cities responded by creating the DFW Board and by jointly adopting the 1968 Regional Airport Concurrent Bond Ordinance (the "Ordinance"). The Ordinance authorized the issuance of bonds to finance the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport ("DFW"). Of critical importance here is section 9.5 of the Ordinance, which contained the cities' agreement to "take such steps as may be necessary, appropriate and legally permissible . . . to provide for the orderly, efficient and effective phase-out at Love Field, Redbird, GSIA and Meacham Field, of any and all Certificated Air Carrier Services, and to transfer such activities to the [DFW] Regional Airport."

The eight CAB-certified air carriers who were using the Dallas and Fort Worth airports first signed "letter agreements" and then later signed "use agreements" with the DFW Board, agreeing to move their air services to DFW as specified in the Ordinance. Southwest, which was solely running intrastate flights from Love Field and thus was exempt from CAB certification and pressure, refused to move to DFW and did not sign a use agreement. Litigation ensued over efforts to force Southwest from Love Field, terminating with our statement that "Southwest Airlines Co. has a federally declared right to the continued use of and access to Love Field, so long as Love Field remains open." Southwest Airlines Co. v. Texas Int'l Airlines, Inc., 546 F.2d 84, 103 (5th Cir. 1977).

Congress deregulated the airline industry in 1978. Shortly thereafter, Southwest applied for permission to provide interstate service between Love Field and New Orleans. CAB granted the application, concluding that it lacked power to deny it. This prompted Congress to intervene by enacting the Wright Amendment. See Pub. L. No. 96-192, § 29, 94 Stat. 35, 48-49 (1980). The Wright Amendment generally bans interstate service from Love Field.1 However, it provides certain exemptions from this ban, two of which are significant here: (1) the commuter airline exemption allows interstate "air transportation provided by commuter airlines operating aircraft with a passenger capacity of 56 passengers or less"; and (2) the contiguous state exemption allows flights to and from Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico, if the flights do not "provide any through service or ticketing with another air carrier" and do not "offer for sale transportation to or from . . . any point which is outside any such State."Id.

In 1996, Dalfort Aviation, the parent corporation of Legend, announced plans to take advantage of the commuter airline exemption by reconfiguring large commuter planes to hold only 56 seats. In response, the DOT General Counsel issued an opinion holding that the exemption applied only to aircraft originally configured to seat less than 57 passengers. The DOT opinion was mooted by the 1997 passage of the "Shelby Amendment" (collectively with the Wright Amendment, the "Love Field amendments"). The Shelby Amendment defined the term "passenger capacity of 56 passengers or less" in the commuter airline exemption to "include[] any aircraft, except aircraft exceeding gross aircraft weight of 300,000 pounds, reconfigured to accommodate 56 or fewer passengers if the total number of passenger seats installed on the aircraft does not exceed 56." See Pub. L. No. 105-66, § 337, 111 Stat. 1425, 1447 (1997).2 The Shelby Amendment also expanded the contiguous states exemption to allow direct flights between Love Field and airports within Kansas, Alabama, and Mississippi. See id.

The parties in this case responded in various ways to the Shelby Amendment. Southwest began offering flights between Love Field and Mississippi and Alabama. Legend has announced plans to offer longhaul service to states outside the Love Field service area using large aircraft reconfigured to have less than 57 seats. Continental Express plans to use regional jets with less than 57 seats to fly between Love Field and Cleveland. Continental Express and American offer intrastate flights from Love Field to their hubs, in Houston and Austin respectively.

In response, Fort Worth sued Dallas, the DFW Board, Legend, Continental, and Continental Express in Texas state court to block the proposed additional service from Love Field. The state court found that the Ordinance was not preempted by federal law and that Dallas was obligated by the Ordinance to preclude airlines from flying between Love Field and areas outside Texas and the four-state service area authorized by the Wright Amendment. The state action is currently on appeal, although the state appellate court has stayed the appeal pending our resolution of this case.

While the state court action was pending, Dallas filed a federal suit against DOT and Fort Worth requesting declaratory relief on essentially the same issues involved in the state action. The federal court has stayed that proceeding pending resolution of the instant case.

At the urging of several of the parties, and while both the federal and state actions were pending, DOT initiated the interpretative proceeding that is the subject of this petition for review. DOT issued an order informing the parties in this action3 that it intended to rule on four "federal law issues" and allowing the parties an opportunity to submit comments on these issues. Subsequently, in response to the parties' initial comments, DOT issued a procedural order which, inter alia, granted the DFW Board's request to resolve a fifth legal issue and granted several parties' request for an extension of time in which to file comments.

DOT ultimately issued a "Declaratory Order" resolving the five questions it had set forth. Specifically, DOT ruled that:

(i) the City of Fort Worth may not enforce any commitment by the City of Dallas . . . to limit operations at Love Field authorized by federal law, and the proprietary powers of the City of Dallas do not allow it to restrict services at Love Field authorized by federal law; (ii) the ability of the City of Dallas to limit the type of airline service operated at Love Field is preempted by the Wright and Shelby Amendments; (iii) any airline operating aircraft with a passenger capacity of no more than 56 passengers and a gross aircraft weight of no more than 300,000 pounds may operate service with any type of equipment and flights of any length from or to Love Field, notwithstanding any claim that such service violates any agreement between the Cities of Dallas and Fort Worth; (iv) the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport Board may not enforce any contract provision that allegedly bars an airline from operating interstate airline service at another airport in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area; and (v) any airline may offer through service between Love Field and any other point to passengers using a flight between Love Field and another point within Texas operated under subsection (a) of the Wright Amendment, as amended by the Shelby Amendment . . . .

Declaratory Order at 58. In an accompanying "Procedural Order," DOT rejected various procedural objections raised by the parties. DOT subsequently reaffirmed its rulings on reconsideration.

II

We have jurisdiction to review DOT's declaratory order by this petition for review. See 49 U.S.C. § 46110(e) ("[A] person disclosing a substantial interest in an order issued by the Secretary of Transportation . . . may apply for review of the order by filing a petition for review in the . . . court of appeals of the United States for the circuit in which the person resides or has its principal place of business."). The standard of review we apply differs according to the specific action DOT took. Our review of DOT's interpretation of the statutes it is charged with administering is governed by the two-step standard of review established in Chevron, U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 104 S. Ct. 2778, 81 L. Ed.2d 694 (1984). We first determine whether Congress directly spoke to the precise question in issue. If the intent of Congress is clear, then we, and the agency, must give effect to the unambiguously expressed intent of Congress. See id....

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