Jan. 27--O'Hare International Airport, which was the world's busiest airport from 1961 through 1997, remained stuck in the No. 2 spot last year in the U.S. as measured by the number of flights, the Federal Aviation Administration said Thursday.
O'Hare handled 878,798 flights in 2011, a slight decline of 0.4 percent from 2010, the FAA said.
Meanwhile, air traffic grew by 3.9 percent at Midway Airport, which ranked No. 27 among the major airports in 2011, the FAA said.
Traffic decreased 2.7 percent last year at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, which retained the No. 1 ranking with 923,991 flights, the FAA said.
Rounding out the top five after Atlanta and O'Hare were Dallas-Ft. Worth International Airport, Denver International Airport and Los Angeles International Airport. The rankings did not change from 2010, the FAA data showed.
Midway handled 255,227 flights in 2011, the FAA said. Midway's No. 27 ranking was the same as in 2010, FAA data showed.
Flights are defined as arrivals and departures.
O'Hare's busiest year was 2004, when the airport accommodated a record 992,471 flights.
Statistics are not yet available on the number of total passengers who traveled through each airport in 2011.
But O'Hare also trailed Atlanta in the passenger category in 2010, according to Airports Council International -- North America. Atlanta served 89.3 million boarding and deplaning passengers in 2010; O'Hare handled 66.8 million passengers. The two airports were followed by Los Angeles, Dallas and Denver in terms of the total departing and arriving passengers, the airports council said.
In 2005, Atlanta overtook O'Hare for the first time in both the flight and passenger categories. It occurred after the FAA in November 2004 imposed hourly caps on arriving flights at O'Hare to reduce mounting delays. The caps were lifted in 2008.
Atlanta first surpassed O'Hare in 1998 for total passengers. A year later, another first occurred as more planes landed and took off in Atlanta than in Chicago. The two airports subsequently exchanged possession of one of the two titles until 2005, when Atlanta claimed both.
Meanwhile, in 2010 Midway was No. 27 in the passenger count with 17.6 million passengers, the airports council reported.
Preliminary 2011 data show that the number of boarding passengers at O'Hare is about the same as in 2010, according to the Chicago Department of Aviation.
The number of boarding passengers last year at Midway was up almost 7 percent from 2010, the department's preliminary statistics show.
"It's significant to note that we were able to maintain traffic levels in 2011 at O'Hare despite economic and airline industry challenges. And Midway had a tremendous year, considering the economy," said Karen Pride, the department's spokeswoman.
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