Southwest Airlines v. High-Speed Rail: More Powerful Than a Locomotive

The airlines threatened most severely, therefore, are those that serve this short-to-medium distance market, such as Southwest Airlines.Southwest is uniquely situated in this conflict; most other airlines competing for short-to-medium distance passengers prefer the more lucrative longer trips, and some airlines view the development as potential relief from airport congestion.9 Furthermore, the TGV-proposed routes were the same cities served by Southwest-the Texas Triangle: Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio.Predictions made during Southwest's battle against high-speed rail claimed the proposed Texas TGV rail system would redirect sixty percent of local air passengers to the rail system.10 After the Texas legislature created the Texas High-Speed Rail Authority in 1989, Southwest Airlines attacked on three major fronts: opposing Congress' ultimately successful attempt to allow the use of taxexempt bonds for high-speed rail development, 1 " encouraging Texas' legislative prohibition of the use of state money for the high-speed rail program, and challenging administratively and judicially the creation of the Authority and award of the franchise in 1991 to the Texas TGV Consortium.Although unsuccessful in this third attack, Southwest is credited with causing delays which contributed to Texas TGV's failure to meet its deadlines under the franchise ogy and air transportation, see Abelardo L. Valdez, Financing High Speed Rail[:] Meeting the Transportation Challenge of the '90s, 18 TRANsP.LJ. 173 (1990).Many of the statistics given in the article are from the Senate Committee on Finance hearings on the high-speed rail/tax-exempt bond legislation passed in 1993.9 James P. Woolsey, High-Speed RaiL Momentum in Key Airline Markets; Advanced Rail Systems Being Pushed Due to Airport and Highway Congestion, AR TRANSPORT WoRLD, July 1990, at 40 (quoting USAir President and Chairman Edwin Colodny).10 Brief of Appellant at 9, Southwest Airlines Co. v.Texas High-Speed Rail Auth., 863 S.W.2d 123 (Tex.App.-Austin 1993, writ denied) (No. 3-92-552-CV) [hereinafter Southwest Brief I].11 Patterson, supra note 3, at 6. Southwest's position was that high-speed rail development should not be government-subsidized at the expense of "self-supporting" commercial aviation, "conveniently overlooking the massive subsidies that the airlines enjoy."Brian K.