The FAA will make a final determination on a temporary flight cap at Newark Airport on or after May 28.
The agency on May 18 wrapped up three days of meetings with domestic airlines operating out of Newark without substantial changes to caps it had proposed ahead of the meeting. The FAA is continuing to propose an arrivals cap in Newark of 28 aircraft per hour until daily construction on one of the airport's three runways is completed on June 15.
After June 15, work on the runway is expected to happen on Saturdays only; the FAA is proposing an arrival cap of 28 flights per hour during construction. When there's no construction, the agency is proposing a cap of 34 flights per hour though Oct. 25.
United, Delta, JetBlue, American, Alaska, Spirit and Allegiant participated in the three-day meeting, which the FAA labeled as productive.
Frontier, Breeze and Sun Country are the other three domestic airlines that fly to Newark.
United, Newark's dominant carrier, has been pushing for temporary limitations there. "Reducing the number of flights scheduled at Newark will help ensure that we can safely and reliably operate the flights that remain on the schedule," the airline said in a statement following the meeting.
Runway work, a shortage of air traffic controllers and recent technology failures have resulted in heavy cancellations and frequent delays at Newark in recent weeks.
United responded to the problems by reducing its Newark schedule by 35 flights per day, while the FAA has issued numerous ground delays to manage traffic there.
On May 19, operations at Newark have been relatively smooth, with FlightAware reporting just three cancellations and 18 delays early in the afternoon.
The FAA has plans in place to fix the technology problems that have afflicted radar and radio communications, including replacing a copper telecommunications line that runs from the New York area to the Philadelphia facility controlling Newark airspace. The new line will be a fiber-optic cable.