Delta gains LaGuardia slots, will create hub there

By MARY JANE CREDEUR and M ARY SCHLANGENSTEIN Bloomberg News

Last update: August 12, 2009 - 9:57 PM

Delta Air Lines Inc. will create a domestic hub at New York's LaGuardia Airport by swapping flight slots with US Airways Group Inc.

Delta will get 125 takeoff and landing slots at LaGuardia to increase its departures by 85 percent as US Airways cuts more than half its flights there and gains space for 42 round trips at Washington National Airport, the airlines said Wednesday.

Expanding at LaGuardia bolsters Delta's focus on New York, where the world's largest carrier has a base for international flights at Kennedy Airport.

Delta ranks No. 2 in passengers in the region behind Continental Airlines Inc., and also competes on U.S. routes with JetBlue Airways Corp.

'New York's hometown airline'

"This is Delta's way of drawing a line in the sand, saying they want to maintain being New York's hometown airline," said Helane Becker, a Jesup & Lamont Securities Corp. analyst in New York. She recommends buying shares of both Delta and US Airways.

Flights are capped at LaGuardia and Washington National, so carriers have to trade to expand.

Delta will spend $40 million to connect its current LaGuardia terminal with the one used by Tempe, Ariz.-based US Airways. Employees now assigned to Washington National will have opportunities to transfer, said Kent Landers, a spokesman. He said he didn't know how many jobs might be affected.

The slot exchange "marks another major step forward in our flight-plan goal to position Delta as the leading airline in New York City," Gail Grimmett, senior vice president of New York operations, said Wednesday in a memo to employees.

Flights to more than 30 cities will be added at LaGuardia, Atlanta-based Delta said. The airline has expanded its presence at Kennedy Airport by 70 percent since 2005.

Delta didn't estimate a financial effect for the slot exchange, while US Airways projected that the swap will boost its profitability by more than $75 million annually.

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