Starting next month, airlines will have to abide by the three-hour time limit on tarmac delays set forth by the Department of Transportation’s “passenger bill of rights,” and carriers are already beginning to balk.

The DOT hopes that airlines will avoid the penalty fees by changing the way they schedule flights and crews.

But JetBlue and Delta have asked the DOT for exemptions while Continental has made it clear that they will cancel flights rather than flirt with fines.

Starting April 29, carriers will be forced to allow passengers to get off the plane if the flight has been delayed for three hours. If they don’t, they’ll be smacked with fines of $27,500 per passenger, which works out to about $3.5 million for a fully loaded, medium-sized plane.

There are some exceptions to this. Foreign carriers will not have to abide by the new rules and U.S. carriers operating international flights will be able to specify in advance their own time limits for deplaning passengers.

Learn more on how these new rules came into being with: Dept. of Transportation Announces Airline Passenger Bill of Rights.

JetBlue and Delta are pleading their case to be included on that list of exceptions, at least temporarily. They are the top two carriers at the notoriously gridlocked JFK airport in New York, which accounts for nearly 75 percent of all chronic airline delays.

To make matters worse, a major runway at JFK was recently closed, causing more logjams on the smaller runways.

The airlines are concerned that delays in New York could cause a ripple effect and prevent pilots and flight crews from reaching their next assignments on time, resulting in more delays and potentially more fines.

Meanwhile, Continental Airlines CEO Jeff Smisek has claimed that the delays are caused by outdated air traffic control systems, not the carriers scheduling.

Continental’s policy will be to cancel flights rather than risk incurring heavy fines. Smisek anticipates that other carriers will follow suit. Because airlines have already cut a number of flights, passengers would have a harder time getting another flight on the same day, causing travelers to miss their destination by days instead of hours.

So who’s in the pilot’s seat? The DOT says consumers are. Even if airlines cancel flights, travelers will ultimately choose the carriers that actually get them to their destination on time, which will force the airlines to play ball.

According to the DOT, the new rules are just the beginning, with more regulations on disclosing baggage fees and overall fares on the way.

By Dan Bence for PeterGreenberg.com.

Related Links: MSNBC, USA Today

PeterGreenberg.com Links:

• Dept. of Transportation, Not Congress, Announces Airline Passenger Bill of Rights
• Travel Detective & Middle Seat Columnist Talk Upgrades, Downgrades, Passenger Rights
• An Air Passenger’s Bill of Rights on The Early Show
• FAA Reauthorization Bill Includes Passenger Rights, Air Traffic Control Modernization
• The Jet Blues
• Travel Detective: Olympic Cities, Airlines’ False Imprisonment and Hotel Safety
• Passenger Rights Activist Kate Hanni Accuses Delta of Hacking Her Email