Dallas is about to become one of the few US cities with three commercial airports. McKinney National Airport (DTX), 30 miles north of downtown, welcomes its first commercial flights on 11 November when Avelo Airlines launches service to Fort Myers — the first of 11 routes from the brand-new terminal. But don't expect to see a Southwest plane there anytime soon.
Southwest's CEO Bob Jordan has been blunt about it: McKinney "just didn't work for our operation for several reasons." McKinney's officials had clearly hoped to land the Boeing 737 giant, but Jordan says the numbers didn't stack up and he isn't worried about the competition.
It's easy to see why Southwest is passing. The airline already runs a massive operation from Dallas Love Field, closer to the city centre — more than six million annual passengers, around 200 daily flights, and routes to 80 domestic destinations (64 year-round, 16 seasonal). Demand there already exceeds the airport's current footprint. Meanwhile, Southwest is moving away from its classic point-to-point model toward denser hub-and-connect operations, and it has never touched Dallas/Fort Worth International either. Spreading itself across a third Dallas-area airport simply doesn't fit the strategy.
So what is McKinney National? Until recently it was a general aviation field — private planes, corporate fleets, flight training — with a single 7,002-foot runway. The city approved a $72 million passenger terminal on the east side of the airfield, and the four-gate facility now stands as Texas's first new commercial airport in over two decades.
Avelo will be the airport's only operator for the foreseeable future, flying to a leisure-heavy roster: six Florida destinations (Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Orlando, Sarasota, Tampa, West Palm Beach) plus Atlanta, Denver, Las Vegas, Nashville and New Orleans.
For travellers, this is genuinely useful if you live in Dallas's northern suburbs — McKinney, Frisco, Plano and beyond. A leisure trip to Florida or Vegas no longer requires the schlep down to Love Field or DFW. The catch is obvious: one airline, 11 routes, four gates. If Avelo doesn't fly where you're going, or you need a connection, DFW and Love Field remain the real gateways. But as a low-cost launching pad for sun-and-fun routes, McKinney is a welcome option for North Texas — and a rare experiment in whether a third airport in one metro can actually work.
