Allegiant Pulls Peoria -Sanford

Citing stiff competition from AirTran's low-cost, non-stop to Orlando flights from the Bloomington airport and skyrocketing fuel costs, Allegiant will scale back its Peoria to Orlando operation next month before eliminating it completely on Dec. 1. The cuts, however, won't threaten Allegiant's more popular direct flights to Las Vegas, which will grow next month to an unprecedented six weekly trips out of the Greater Peoria Regional Airport, consistently the airline's best seller for Vegas vacations and only market to operate as many departures.

"The Vegas market continues to be incredibly successful for us," said Tyri Squyres, spokeswoman for Allegiant. "Fuel costs just magnified all the issues with (Orlando flights)."
Unlike the Las Vegas flights, which average monthly passenger loads of between 85 percent and 92 percent of cabin capacity, the Orlando service quickly peaked at a nearly 80 percent load factor in June - its first full month of operation - before losing altitude.
The number of passengers plummeted to 60 percent in July, 50 percent in August and 55 percent in September, the last month for which complete airport records are available.

"We tried to market it heavy and pick up the numbers further, but fuel keeps rising," said interim Peoria airport director Mary DeVries. "They were not pulling the numbers that they needed" for the flights to be profitable.