Springtime means a return to travel. Which means a return of flyers to the nation's airports. Which means a spike in airport congestion, overcrowded flights, and flight delays.
Working around the predictable unpleasantness requires knowing where it will occur.
, attempts to precisely predict this spring's airport pain points, down to the date and airport.
The worst dates to fly, by month, are:
March - Thursday, March 1; Monday, March 12; Tuesday, March 13
April - Tuesday, April 3; Saturday, April 7
May - Saturday, May 19; Tuesday, May 22
Of course, even on the worst days, not all airports will perform equally poorly. Based on on-time performance during the three-month period over the past five years, these are the 10 airports expected to have the worst records:
Newark Liberty Airport, NJ - Average on-time performance: 76.8%
Houston Hobby, TX - Average on-time performance: 77.0%
Dallas Love Field, TX - Average on-time performance: 77.6%
San Francisco, CA - Average on-time performance: 77.8%
New York LaGuardia, NY - Average on-time performance: 78.1%
Chicago O'Hare, IL - Average on-time performance: 78.3%
Chicago Midway, IL - Average on-time performance: 78.3%
Ft. Lauderdale, FL - Average on-time performance: 78.5%
New York JFK, NY - Average on-time performance: 79.0%
Dallas/Ft. Worth, TX - Average on-time performance: 79.3%
After 20 years working in the travel industry, and 15 years writing about it, Tim Winship knows a thing or two about travel. Follow him on Twitter@twinship.
Smart Hacks for Hassle-free Travel
Learn from the pros with travel tips and tricks that make getting from here to there a breeze. Travel smarter one email at a time.
