Dallas Love Field is
located just a few miles
northwest of downtown Dallas, Texas.
It has a distinguished aviation history.
It was commissioned in 1917,
as a training base during World War I.
The airport is named for Army
Lieutenant Moss Lee Love,
who died during flight
training in California.
It was busy until the opening
of Dallas Fort Worth
International Airport.
An amendment to the International
Air Transportation
Act of 1979, called the Wright Amendment,
restricted Love Field's
passenger operations
to destinations in Texas
and neighboring states.
The restrictions were gradually lifted
until the law was repealed
in its entirety in 2014.
Today, passenger aircraft
fly to destinations all over the country.
Love Field has two runways,
and is the headquarters
for Southwest Airlines.
It serves 44,000 passengers every day,
and more than 16
million passengers per year.
Annual take-offs and
landings at Love
Field are about 230,000 annually.
It also brings in customers
from every corner of the world
and its reputation
for high-quality
maintenance and aircraft
finishing services.
Those services mean that Love
Field is a busy corporate
and general aviation airport
that brings jobs to the community.
So how does air traffic move
into and out of Love Field?
The Federal Aviation
Administration oversees
a safe and efficient movement of aircraft
throughout the national airspace system,
including Love Field.
The FAA continually updates
and modernizes its services
to improve how pilots
and air traffic controllers
see, navigate and communicate
with each other.
First, let's look at how airplanes fly.
Aircraft take off and land into the wind.
The runways at Love
Field were built to take advantage
of the prevailing winds in the area.
The wind patterns
mean that in the summer,
aircraft often take off to the south,
and in the winter,
aircraft more often
take off to the north.
However, these patterns can change
depending upon weather,
traffic volume and runway
repair or construction.
Even though a runway is a
single strip of pavement,
it's treated as two separate surfaces.
Runways are identified
by the compass heading
the aircraft is facing
as it lands or takes off.
For example, at Dallas Love Field,
you will see runway 13,
which is facing 130 degrees,
and on the reverse,
runway 31, which is 310 degrees.
Parallel runways
are further designated
with L for left
or R for right.
At Love Field,
that translates into runway
13 Right/31 Left
and runway
13 Left/31 Right.
Runways are continually monitored
as part of the overall safety program.
When a runway closes
for repair reconstruction,
air traffic controllers
will temporarily re-route traffic
in order to use the remaining runway
in a safe and efficient manner.
Communities are notified
through the environmental process
or additional outreach,
such as a notification
done for the runway
13 Right/31 Left
reconstruction.
At Love Field, construction
will shift traffic to the other runway.
With some limitations,
the airport is able to handle
that traffic on a single runway.
In fact, Dallas Love Field is now known
as one of the busiest
single runway airports in the nation,
just after San Diego.
Love Field will return to two runways
in early 2022,
when construction is completed.
The runway work will enable the airport
to run efficiently
for the next several years.
Modern technology
is bringing many improvements
to Dallas Love Field.
The airport's close
proximity to Dallas-Fort
Worth International Airport
creates busy and congested airspace.
In fact, the routes in the sky
can be as congested
as a rush-Hour freeway.
This means that air traffic routes
are carefully choreographed,
with each aircraft movement
being determined
by the flow of traffic around it.
Together, air traffic
controllers and modern
satellite technology ensure
that every flight
into and out of the Dallas-Fort
Worth metropolitan area
is guided safely to its destination.
In 2019,
Love Field's, air
traffic procedures were updated
to take advantage of modern
satellite technology,
enabling pilots to use
satellite navigation
as opposed to relying
solely on ground-based navigation aids.
These new procedures create
more predictable routes,
enabling pilots to pass
specific points in space
at exact intervals,
keeping traffic safely
separated in three-dimensional space.
Satellite-based procedures
also reduce the amount of spoken
communications needed between pilots
and controllers,
allowing for an increased focus
on aircraft positioning and performance.
The airspace is used
more efficiently,
reducing delays, and can increase airport
access in all weather conditions.
It also brings the airport
up-to-date on the current
procedures used at
other airports nationwide,
enabling traffic to move more efficiently
between departure and arrival points.
This is important in an area like Dallas,
where Love Field's, take-offs and landings
have to work closely
with the runways at Dallas-Fort
Worth International Airport,
as well as other airports in the area.
One of the new procedures is
called Optimized Profile Descent, or OPD.
It enables an aircraft to descend
on a continuous vertical path
instead of the traditional procedure,
which required the pilot to level off
slow and descend in intervals.
OPD's eliminate the slowing
and powering-up motions.
Love Field will continue to bring
more jobs and businesses
to the community it serves.
It's important to note the decisions
about where airplanes fly
are complex, involve
three-dimensional airspace,
and can impact operations
at other airports
as well as other communities.
The FAA's mission is to provide
the most efficient
airspace system in the world,
but to do so in the safest
manner, recognizing the needs
of all parties in the system.
Would you like to learn more
about airspace and modernization
at Dallas Love Field?
Please continue to follow our website
for more information.