The Wright Amendment of 1979 was a United States federal law that governed traffic at Dallas Love Field, an airport in Dallas, Texas, to protect Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) from competition. The amendment—enacted in reaction to the refusal of Southwest Airlines to vacate Love Field and move to DFW—prohibited carriers from operating full-size airliners between Love Field and destinations beyond Texas and its four neighboring states. Further amendments in 1997 and 2005 added new states and relaxed aircraft rules for longer range service. The law was partially repealed in 2006 and then fully repealed in 2014.
Background
By the early 1960s, Love Field was reaching the limits of its terminal and parking capacity despite repeated expansion projects, and its runways were too short to accommodate new intercontinental jets. Greater Southwest International Airport (GSIA or GSW) had been constructed in Fort Worth in the 1950s, but efforts to share the new airport had proven unsuccessful due to the entrenched rivalry between the two cities. at Love and GSW to move to the new regional airport.
To protect the regional airport from competition and thereby protect bond investments, the cities of Dallas and Fort Worth signed the Regional Airport Concurrent Bond Ordinance on 12 November 1968, which reads in part: