Port Of Oakland Aviation Director: Oakland Airport Can Legally Change Name

A lack of geographical awareness of where Metropolitan Oakland International Airport (OAK) is, especially among international passengers, has long been a “sticking point” in attracting and maintaining routes, necessitating a name change, according to the airport’s interim director.

Craig Simon, the interim director of aviation for the Port of Oakland, which owns and runs OAK, told Aviation Week Network in an interview that the port is confident it will be able to change the name of the airport to “San Francisco Bay Oakland International” even as the city of San Francisco has sued to stop the rebranding.

Simon noted OAK sits on the east side of San Francisco Bay, with its main runway “really right off of the bay." 

"Aircraft flying into and out of Oakland depart and arrive over San Francisco Bay,” Simon said.

The port’s board of commissioners is set to vote on final approval for the name change at a May 9 meeting, following unanimous preliminary approval on April 11.

San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu has filed a lawsuit seeking to stop the name change, alleging federal trademark infringement on San Francisco International Airport (SFO). Chiu said the name change would “very likely cause widespread confusion” for passengers—particularly international travelers—and wrongly imply there is a business relationship between OAK and SFO.

But Simon said there is a lack of awareness “east of the Mississippi” in the U.S. and internationally that OAK, 20 mi. from San Francisco’s financial district, is a Bay Area airport. SFO, which sits on the west side of San Francisco Bay, and OAK are 30 mi. driving distance apart.

As a result, Simon added, airlines have had difficulty maintaining routes and are reluctant to add new routes. From July 2008 to March 2024, OAK added 54 new routes, but only 15 of these remain, and six preexisting routes have also been cut, meaning OAK has lost 45 routes over a nearly 16-year period, according to Simon.

“We've been studying this for a number of years,” he said. “It's really about the airport and the Port of Oakland taking that next step to help our airlines and sustain our passenger traffic … We've heard from a number of travelers about their desire for more nonstop destinations, both domestic and international. In order for this to happen, we really need people from those inbound markets to know exactly where Oakland is—that it sits in the greater San Francisco Bay Area.”

Southwest Airlines, the dominant passenger airline at OAK, has publicly endorsed the name change, as has ULCC Spirit Airlines (the airport’s second-largest carrier) and Mexico’s Volaris.

“We've had these conversations with airlines, both ones that operate here and ones that we hope to have operating here in the future—and it continues to be that sticking point of not knowing geographically where Oakland sits,” Simon said.

He added that “multiple places throughout the U.S.—Chicago, Dallas, New York, Washington, D.C.—have multiple airports [using the city's name] serving a geographical location. And so we certainly feel this is obviously not the first time this has happened in the U.S. or in the world, and therefore there's a good track record of it working out very well for all airports in a region."

United Airlines, which has a hub at SFO, has publicly opposed the name change.

According to OAG Schedules Analyser data, OAK is connected nonstop to 42 destinations, 36 of which are in the U.S. Five are in Mexico, and one in El Salvador.

The airport handled 11.2 million passengers in 2023, up 0.8% compared to 2022. Three new airlines announced service during the year: Avianca from San Salvador, El Salvador; Viva Aerobus from Monterrey, Mexico; and Sun Country Airlines from Minneapolis-St. Paul.