FAA Will Order Significant Flight Cuts At Chicago O’Hare—American vs. United Battle Hits Breaking Point

American Airlines and United are in a pitched battle at Chicago O’Hare. American had gates taken away at the airport because they hadn’t build back their schedule fully after Covid. This was done earlier than expected based on lease documents.

The airline wants to protect its current gates, and even bought more from Spirit Airlines. United wants to keep American from growing, and even see them pull back. So both airlines have been adding flights.

• United will offer its largest schedule in Chicago ever this summer. They will serve 222 total destinations (175 domestic, 47 international) with up to 750 flights per day. That’s about 25% more than they were flying in 2019 (pre-pandemic).
• Meanwhile, American is targeting “more than 180 destinations.” I get to 183. And they are only back to roughly pre-pandemic levels with just over 500 flights per day.

In a real sense, it’s United that is adding capacity at an unsustainable clip for the airport. The FAA has said this cannot hold, and they are going to force schedule reductions.

The FAA will hold a “scheduling reduction” process for thje airport and then issue an operating limits order for the Summer 2026 season from March 29, 2026 through October 25, 2026. This will occur under delay reduction authority in 49 U.S.C. § 41722.

Airlines have now published schedules showing approximately 3,080 peak daily takeoffs and landings versus 2,680 last summer. They believe 2,800 are manageable.

That implies cuts of 280 operations (140 takeoffs and 140 landings) per peak day, or roughly 9% of the current schedule.

The meeting is scheduled to begin with opening remarks on March 3rd at 3 p.m., following the formal schedule reduction discussions on March 4 at 9 a.m. It’s open to all scheduled carriers, including those not currently serving O’Hare, as well as the Chicago Department of Aviation.

Here’s what’s supposed to happen:

• The FAA distributes a 30-minute period demand picture for the airport from 6 a.m. through midnight. It will flag severely congested periods, and provide general reduction targets.
• They will meet separately with each carrier in confidential sessions to solicit reduction offers and schedule modifications.
• The FAA will review offers and publish a final order in the Federal Register with carrier-specific limitations.

This applies to U.S. airlines only and will not affect foreign carrier schedules.

According to American Airlines,

American commends Secretary Duffy, Administrator Bedford and the FAA for taking proactive action to ensure the operational integrity of the airfield and airspace in Chicago. The FAA now has the opportunity to achieve an improved customer experience for passengers traveling from, to and through Chicago this summer.
This isn’t just flattering your regulators. United is growing more than American at O’Hare, so American goes in expecting that United will have to cut back more. Even if both had to cut 9% of their current schedule, that’s a bigger cut to United. And all of these additional departing seats from Chicago will mean lower fares. That’s actually bad for both airlines.

In fact, it’s not likely to be an across-the-board set of cuts. They look at 30-minute windows and target reductions for each one, because peak times have more traffic. And because each flight is equal (a takeoff and landing) it’s easier to remove high frequency short haul regional jet flights.

Some of the most recent frequency additions may be the ones most likely to get cut. Out of the new service United has announced since fall, flights to 17 destinations are on regional jets while 4 destinations will be served by 737s.

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