{"id":5775,"date":"2012-03-20T06:30:13","date_gmt":"2012-03-20T12:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/?p=5775"},"modified":"2013-05-13T17:36:14","modified_gmt":"2013-05-13T23:36:14","slug":"flight-cuts-hit-midsize-cities-as-they-try-for-a-turnaround","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/2012\/03\/20\/flight-cuts-hit-midsize-cities-as-they-try-for-a-turnaround\/","title":{"rendered":"Flight Cuts Hit Midsize Cities As They Try For A Turnaround"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Molly Messick \/ StateImpact Idaho<\/p>

On a Monday morning, the Southwest ticket counter at Boise Airport was mostly vacant. The airline recently suspended service from Boise to Seattle, Salt Lake and Reno.<\/p><\/div>\n

Boise resident C.K. Haun has this routine down.\u00a0 He may live in Idaho, but he\u2019s a senior engineer at Apple.\u00a0 Long before the sun is up, he arrives at the Boise Airport, to catch his regular flight to San Jose.\u00a0 “I can do this by autopilot now,” he says. “Most of the TSA people know me, and we smile and say hi.\u00a0 Every Monday morning, week in week out!”<\/p>\n

<\/param><\/param><\/embed><\/object>Flight Cuts Hit Midsize Cities As They Try For A Turnaround<\/a><\/p>\n

Haun has been making this commute for seven years.\u00a0 Not long ago, he saw a surprising change.\u00a0 His return flight \u2013 the one that came back after the workday \u2013 vanished.\u00a0 The only option was a flight leaving San Jose in the late morning.\u00a0 Haun says that\u2019s bad for him, and bad for Boise.\u00a0 He points to the software developers and hardware manufacturers that call Boise home.\u00a0 Haun predicts they\u2019ll have a harder time without that one-day, back-and-forth trip.<\/p>\n

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Airports Council International - North America<\/p>

To see a graph of how midsize airports have been affected by flight cuts, click on the image above.<\/p><\/div>\n

“It\u2019s the whole valley that really is going to suffer if we don\u2019t have great movement between the technology hub of the Silicon Valley and the burgeoning technology industries we have up here,” Haun says.\u00a0 “Modern transportation is critical for the economic success of the Treasure Valley.”<\/p>\n

It\u2019s no secret that airlines are cutting back.\u00a0 Faced with the double hit of the recession and high fuel prices, they’ve had no choice but to offer fewer flights and fly fuller planes.\u00a0 Midsize airports like Boise\u2019s have been especially hard hit<\/a> by those decisions.\u00a0 Frontier and Southwest<\/a> are only the most recent airlines to reduce the number of flights to and from the city.\u00a0 Like C.K. Haun, Boise business leaders worry all of this could spell trouble for Boise\u2019s bid to become a turnaround town.<\/p>\n

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Molly Messick \/ StateImpact Idaho<\/p>

Bill Connors is the president and CEO of the Boise Metro Chamber of Commerce.<\/p><\/div>\n

When he learned of the flight shift, Haun summed up his concerns and sent them off in a letter.\u00a0 A copy of it landed on the desk of Bill Connors, president and CEO of the Boise Metro Chamber of Commerce, who talked it over with airport officials.\u00a0 “All of us agree \u2013 that\u2019s a strategic route for us,” he says.<\/p>\n

Connors had already been thinking about Boise\u2019s air service.\u00a0 He says the city is lucky to be just a short trip from major hubs, like Salt Lake City and Denver.\u00a0 But that doesn\u2019t mean Boise can afford to lose<\/em> flights.\u00a0 After all, it\u2019s one of the most remote cities in the country.\u00a0 Connors says that means Boise has to be proactive.\u00a0 “These are market forces at work,” he says, “and if those planes aren\u2019t full, the airlines are going to make some decisions based on the marketplace.\u00a0 So, now it becomes important to us to see, ‘Are there some incentives to keep particular routes alive?'”<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t just about the San Jose flight.\u00a0 It\u2019s about making sure Boise is as well connected as it can be. \u00a0Connors says ensuring that could mean asking hard questions of Boise\u2019s business community.\u00a0 For example, Connors says, “‘How much travel do you do between those two cities, and can you pledge that you\u2019re going to buy x number of tickets?’\u00a0 And maybe even go a step further and say, ‘Hey, would you kick in a little something for a marketing fund to try to attract these folks?’\u00a0 You know, put a little skin in the game.”<\/p>\n

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Molly Messick \/ StateImpact Idaho<\/p>

Bryant Francis, a Boise Airport Deputy Director, is making Boise's case to airlines.<\/p><\/div>\n

If they do try to retain or attract particular flights, Boise business leaders will be pushing back against big trends.\u00a0 In 2007, the Boise Airport tallied more than 3.3 million passengers.\u00a0 Last year, the number was 2.8 million.\u00a0 It\u2019s those kinds of declines that have airlines scrambling to contain costs.\u00a0 Midsize airports are scrambling, too.\u00a0 “It\u2019s not just Boise Airport that\u2019s out there trying to grow again,” says Bryant Francis, a deputy director of the Boise Airport.\u00a0 “It\u2019s all the other airports as well.”<\/p>\n

It’s Francis’s job to make Boise\u2019s case to the airlines.\u00a0 He cultivates relationships and marshals facts.\u00a0 Lately, it\u2019s a job that\u2019s more and more competitive.\u00a0 “In years past, there were airports that just really weren\u2019t in the game,” he says.\u00a0 “They weren\u2019t out there marketing themselves to the carriers.\u00a0 They weren\u2019t doing a lot of advertising within their local community to ensure that those in the community that were looking to fly thought of their airport first.\u00a0 And that has changed.”<\/p>\n

In other words, there are more airports grasping for a scarce resource: flights. \u00a0\u00a0At the same time, as Francis knows well, there\u2019s only so much any airport can do to reverse its short-term fortunes.\u00a0 “The airlines aren\u2019t here for us,” he says.\u00a0 “The airlines are here for themselves and their shareholders.\u00a0 And it\u2019s what we, our market, can do for them that is the most important thing.”<\/p>\n

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Molly Messick \/ StateImpact Idaho<\/p>

Deputy Director Francis collects all sorts of airplane replicas and figurines. They adorn the shelves on his wall, as well as his desk.<\/p><\/div>\n

Aviation consultant Michael Boyd<\/a> couldn’t agree more.\u00a0 “The reality of it is, you can get all the aggressive you want,” he says.\u00a0 “There\u2019s no airline store, and there\u2019s a limited amount of additional air service you can attract.”<\/p>\n

He also says midsize cities like Boise shouldn\u2019t look at the number of flights going in and out. The key issue, he says, is access to the rest of the world.\u00a0 Not convenient access.\u00a0 Just access.\u00a0 Period.\u00a0 “This is the number one issue,” he says.\u00a0 “Can Mr. Jian get here from Beijing?\u00a0 Can Mr. Smith get here from New York City? Boise ain\u2019t never going to have a nonstop to New York City!\u00a0 But you probably have, each day, five or six option in terms of when you can leave to get to New York City with one connection.”<\/p>\n

Boyd says Boise may actually be in an enviable position.\u00a0 Yes, the city\u2019s remoteness makes strong air service important.\u00a0 But it also means the Boise Airport doesn\u2019t have nearby competitors.\u00a0 It has a captive customer base.\u00a0 In that sense, the city\u2019s weakness is also its strength.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Boise resident C.K. Haun has this routine down.\u00a0 He may live in Idaho, but he\u2019s a senior engineer at Apple.\u00a0 Long before the sun is up, he arrives at the Boise Airport, to catch his regular flight to San Jose.\u00a0 “I can do this by autopilot now,” he says. “Most of the TSA people know […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":5778,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[68,176,46,47],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5775"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5775"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5775\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9706,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5775\/revisions\/9706"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/idaho\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}