DJ Air

We have all read the stories about a new start-up airline, DJ Air, considering Worcester along with New Haven and Trenton as their base for operations. Obviously this would be great for the City of Worcester, but we need to look at this realistically.

1. DJ Air Group needs 100 million of venture capital. In recent years JetBlue has been a success but who else? SouthEast Airlines closed earlier this year, Inpendence Air is in big trouble and several legacy carriers may not be around in a couple years. Envisioning Wall Street lining up to cough up 100 million on a start-up airlines based out of Worcester, Ma seems like a stretch.
2. DJ Air Group needs FAA certification which can take years. I have been watching MaxJet (http://www.maxjet.com), POGO Air and Bold Air for over a year now and none of these carriers have yet to have their first flight.
3. Access Road... Sorry, an operation that Allegiant proposes for the leisure traveler does not require an access road. It does, however, require better signage and the establishment of one road that is the preferred road to the airport. If DJ Air is going to raise 100 million then get FAA certification, Worcester will have a very difficult time convincing DJ Air to call ORH home without an access road.

I hope that I am wrong, but we need to put DJ Air in the long-term (long-shot) goal category. We need to focus rather on the short-term goals, especially when the current airport is losing $2,000,000 per year and we are now 22 months away from picking up the entire tab (this year we only pay 15% of it). July 1, 2007, the date current agreeement with MassPort ends will be here before you know it .