From George Francuski
Kingman, Arizona
Great Lakes Airlines, headquartered in Cheyenne, has lost Essential Air Service funding. This means the end of the only regularly scheduled commercial air service for the entire county of Mohave County, Arizona.
Once more, the leaders of this airline have failed us.
Kingman Airport is owned by the city of Kingman. Great Lakes Airline provides year-round air service at the airport. Travel options are now fewer for the 200,000 residents of Mohave County.
Great Lakes officials have done our county a tremendous disservice. This national airline is the largest recipient of Essential Air Service funds. At the time of its application to secure the funds, half of its revenue - yes, half of its total revenue - was this government subsidy.
When Congress decided to deregulate the airline industry, it recognized airlines would drastically cut back the cities they serviced - flying only those cities that would be profitable.
It developed the Essential Air Service program to let airlines keep flying to cities like Kingman. These subsidies were intended to provide funds until the airline could promote and establish the profitability of these routes.
Great Lakes had no desire to promote air service in Kingman. There were no advertisements in our local newspapers, no radio spots on our radio stations, no television ads on our station, or even direct mailers.
Its business plan was to fly its planes only to meet the terms of the federal contract. That meant Essential Air Service money for every landing, regardless if any passengers deplaned.
Why fly passengers requiring additional fuel, airline personnel, baggage handling, servicing customers, etc., when you can collect a tidy sum and save the wear and tear on your aircraft and pay for the very minimum of employees needed?
By failing to build ridership, Great Lakes has eliminated any commercial airline from considering servicing airports in the county.
If Great Lakes used the federal funds for what they were intended, this route would show a profit for any airline wishing to serve Mohave County.
If Great Lakes would have acted as a responsible member of our business community, we would not be losing this valuable resource.
Source: http://www.wyomingnews.com
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment