United Airlines has tentatively won US government approval to operate a daily flight between San Francisco International Airport (SFO) and Tokyo Haneda Airport (HND).
US airlines are allowed to operate four daily round-trip flights to/from Haneda, Tokyo’s downtown airport that began handling international flights in 2010. The new United SFO-HND route, tentatively approved by the US Department of Transportation (DOT), would replace American Airlines’ New York JFK-HND service, which American dropped in December 2013.
United beat out Hawaiian Airlines for the available HND slot pair; Hawaiian had sought to operate a daily service between Kona, Hawaii and HND. The other three US roundtrip flights to HND are operated by Hawaiian from Honolulu and by Delta Air Lines from Los Angeles and Seattle. Delta originally operated a Detroit-HND service but moved it to Seattle.
DOT said in a statement it “determined that United’s San Francisco-Haneda service proposal would provide the best use of the one available opportunity. DOT tentatively found that United’s proposal would introduce a new US carrier at Haneda and would promote competition by giving business and leisure travelers an additional choice for connecting service to Haneda via United’s well-established San Francisco hub.”
Any objections to DOT’s tentative awarding of the HND slot pair to United must be submitted to DOT by March 10.
US airlines are allowed to operate four daily round-trip flights to/from Haneda, Tokyo’s downtown airport that began handling international flights in 2010. The new United SFO-HND route, tentatively approved by the US Department of Transportation (DOT), would replace American Airlines’ New York JFK-HND service, which American dropped in December 2013.
United beat out Hawaiian Airlines for the available HND slot pair; Hawaiian had sought to operate a daily service between Kona, Hawaii and HND. The other three US roundtrip flights to HND are operated by Hawaiian from Honolulu and by Delta Air Lines from Los Angeles and Seattle. Delta originally operated a Detroit-HND service but moved it to Seattle.
DOT said in a statement it “determined that United’s San Francisco-Haneda service proposal would provide the best use of the one available opportunity. DOT tentatively found that United’s proposal would introduce a new US carrier at Haneda and would promote competition by giving business and leisure travelers an additional choice for connecting service to Haneda via United’s well-established San Francisco hub.”
Any objections to DOT’s tentative awarding of the HND slot pair to United must be submitted to DOT by March 10.