During an antitrust trial over its Northeast Alliance partnership with JetBlue, American Airlines has argued that the only way it can compete in New York is by teaming up with the smaller airline. The problem, American says, is that it’s impossible to get access to new “slots” that allow it to schedule more departures and arrivals from the capacity-controlled New York airports.
While that’s true for all airlines, American is in the unique position of having given away slots it…