United Airlines has a brand new friend in Queens.
The airline plans to return to Latest York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport again, this time through a brand new partnership with JetBlue Airways.
The partnership, called Blue Sky, will allow the airlines to sell seats on one another’s sites and let JetBlue customers earn frequent flyer miles on United and vice versa. It also includes reciprocal loyalty advantages like priority boarding and roomier seats for travelers with elite status. The deal is subject to regulatory review, the airlines said.
Some points of the partnership, which the carriers announced Thursday, will begin as early as the autumn, though the airlines didn’t provide exact timing. In addition they didn’t provide financial details of the deal.
JetBlue’s leaders have long said they need a partnership to higher compete against larger airlines like United and their shared rival Delta Air Lines, probably the most profitable U.S. carrier.
United CEO Scott Kirby told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Thursday that along with the JFK access, the airlines together can have the most important presence in Boston and that United will have the ability to increase its reach in Florida and the Caribbean, where JetBlue has a strong network. In turn, JetBlue loyalists will get access to United’s globe-spanning destinations.
“It makes each airline more competitive,” Kirby said.
The brand new partnership stops in need of the flight coordination that JetBlue had in its former alliance within the Northeast with American Airlines, which was struck down by a federal court on antitrust grounds two years ago. Last 12 months, a judge blocked JetBlue’s plan to purchase struggling budget carrier Spirit.
“This collaboration with United is a daring step forward for the industry — one which brings together two
customer-focused airlines to deliver more selections for travelers and value across our networks,” JetBlue CEO Joanna Geraghty said in a news release.
United left JFK in 2015, and Kirby has called that a mistake because moving transcontinental flights to Newark, Latest Jersey, allowed American to win over some corporate clients. It briefly returned in 2021, because of a Covid-era lull in traffic on the airport, where capability is often tightly controlled by the Federal Aviation Administration.
United left JFK again in 2022 since it wasn’t in a position to secure longer-term slots there.
Kirby has repeatedly said he wants the airline to return to JFK. The carrier has struggled in recent weeks with air traffic staffing shortages and congestion at its Newark hub.
Under the brand new agreement, United will have the ability to fly as much as seven day by day round-trip flights at congested Kennedy Airport, giving it more breadth within the Latest York City area, though the brand new operation will still be dwarfed by United’s foremost hub in the world at Newark Liberty International Airport.
United’s JFK flights will begin in 2027 on the earliest, the carriers said. JetBlue, meanwhile, will get eight flights at Newark. United didn’t say which routes it plans to operate at JFK, though its last foray was for service to Los Angeles and San Francisco.
They airlines called the swap a “net neutral exchange.”Â
