August 23, 2006

Worc Business Journal Daily News Flash

Allegiant's says airport departure "should not have been surprise". Fuel costs and sub-par passenger headcounts have forced Allegiant Air to cease operating at Worcester Regional Airport as of September 3, the company says. Allegiant, based in Las Vegas, had been operating twice-weekly flights between Worcester and Orlando-Sanford International Airport for nine months, and the operator's presence there was considered an anchor that could draw other airlines to the struggling airport. Allegiant spokeswoman Tyri Squyres said the company's decision "should not have been a surprise" to city officials, and that the airline, the city, and Massport had been in discussions about the performance of Worcester's airport "for months and months." Squyres said the passenger headcounts were lower than the 85 to 90 percent capacity figure cited by City Manager Michael O'Brien, and called Worcester the "worst performing city that we have in our system."

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

So the bride and her new groom have been in discussions for months about a possible pending divorce, yet the newly weds throw a gala 10,000th passenger party less than 2 months ago and even have the cahonnes to invite the local media to broadcast the gala?

Unbelievable. How can the city have any credibilty on this issue now?

Good thing Uncle Sam didnt send along that $1,000,000 check to the newly weds quite yet.

So will it be in the mail soon? Afterall, we did stay married for almost 9 months.

Or are we out the $1M ?


If I am Allgiant and a new airline is possibly coming to oRH and this new airline will cannabalize my existing, fragile customer base, what do I do?

I'd tell the city backoff or I am taking my ball and going home.

Joe Gargery said...

Looks like Worcester was 4th worst.

Still, the city should have stepped up their marketing efforts, rather than advertising on pizza boxes.

These are cities with over 10,000 seats departing this year (Jan - May)

City Seats Pax Load
Fresno, CA 14550 9179 63.09
Colorado Springs, CO 16480 12366 75.04
Ft. Collins/Loveland, CO 17400 13274 76.29
Worcester, MA 10750 8287 77.09
Mission/Mcallen/Edinburg, TX 13910 10764 77.38
Springfield, MO 19580 15304 78.16
Las Vegas, NV 337290 265798 78.80
Toledo, OH 27010 21451 79.42
Des Moines, IA 29290 23518 80.29
Wichita, KS 18430 14880 80.74
Belleville, IL 12620 10193 80.77
Portsmouth, NH 13200 10713 81.16
South Bend, IN 19140 15556 81.27
Sanford, FL 134980 111047 82.27
Peoria, IL 19610 16238 82.80
Sioux Falls, SD 19600 16369 83.52
Cedar Rapids/Iowa City, IA 22350 18892 84.53
Rockford, IL 29850 25567 85.65
Green Bay/Clintonville, WI 17080 14680 85.95
Lansing, MI 24090 20712 85.98
Bismarck/Mandan, ND 11250 9721 86.41
Reno, NV 15000 12983 86.55
Newburgh/Poughkeepsie, NY 13010 11357 87.29
Allentown/Bethlehem/Easton, PA 12430 11123 89.49
Bullhead City, AZ 23400 21198 90.59
Bellingham, WA 16350 14872 90.96

Bill Randell said...

Charley:

Keep in mind that your results are thru May and I know we did not do very well this summer. Maybe through August we could have dropped 4 places??

Believe me I am not proud of that but my experience is that Allegiant is nothing but dead honest.

Anonymous said...

off topic here but someone changed our Wikipedia article to "Worcester-MetroWest-Boston-Airport" whcih of course is wrong so now people type in Worcester Regional airport and they get nothing...someone needs to move it back to Worcester Regional Airport...I cxant as I dont know how to...thought maybe someone here knew how to..