When Seaport Airlines took over as Great Bend’s Essential Air Service provider in June, it
offered flights to Wichita. However, the air carrier has learned those
flights were not that popular and this was putting Great Bend Municipal
Airport’s federally-funding EAS status at risk, a company official told
the City Council Monday night.
“We want to do everything
we can to continue our partnership,” Seaport’s Jeff Dale said. “We want
to get more people on that plane.”
So, at the request of
Seaport, the council voted to submit a letter to the United States
Department of Transportation seeking permission to drop the flights to
Wichita and replace them with flights to Kansas City, Kan. The USDOT has
the final say in the matter since it is the agency that manages the EAS
program.
The Seaport Airline
proposal is to replace the 12 weekly round trips to Wichita and six
one-stop flights to Kansas City with 12 weekly round trips to Kansas
City. Although number of daily departures would decline by a third,
hours flown by Seaport would increase by 50 percent.
Flights to Kansas City
showed a higher usage, a study done by Seaport in August noted. Despite
being a one-stop and having 50 percent less frequency than Wichita,
Kansas City flights generated 69 percent of the traffic since SeaPort
took over EAS service.
What does this mean?
Airport Manager Martin Miller said the feds will subsidise the carriers
at airports like Great Bend up to a $1,000 per passenger under the EAS
designation.
However, when passenger
counts go down, the subsidy paid to the airlines increases, something
frowned upon by the DOT. Through August, subsidy per passenger averaged
$1,462.
The result the change, Miller said, would be increased usage which would reduce the subsidy.
Dale said the ticket price would remain at the current $49 to $99 price points.
If approved by the DOT, the new schedule would take affect Nov. 16.
The request came with the endorsement of the Airport Advisory Committee held a special meeting on the matter Sept. 10.
In June, SeaPort
Airlines, based in Portland, Ore., started commercial air service from
Great Bend, offering flights to Wichita Mid-Continent Airport and
Kansas City International Airport. The carrier, which also serves the
Salina Regional Airport, was awarded a two-year Essential Air Service
contract for Great Bend by the United States Department of
Transportation, replacing Great Lakes Aviation.
- Source: http://www.gbtribune.com
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