That’s actually not true for airlines, which are the better analogy here. For airline traffic airports have slots, which are basically appointments, attached to fixed flight schedules.

At the most congested airports slots are highly valuable, to the point where they’re often listed separately as part of an airline’s assets, and airlines will sometimes trade slots.

Many countries will fine airlines if they miss their slot time for reasons that aren’t related to emergencies or bad weather, as well as fine them for any other slot misuse such as hoarding, strategic cancellation, etc.

Now, sure, it’s not a case where if you miss the slot you can’t land or take off. The airport and ATC will always try to accommodate flights no matter what. But it usually means fairly substantial delays to avoid impacting on other take off, landing, and gate slots.