'Big Dig' Has Boston Cos. Probing Options
<B>'Big Dig' Has Boston Cos. Probing Options</B>
By Bob Curley
Snarled traffic and delays at Logan Airport, combined with the lure of lower fares at other airports in the region, have made Boston-area companies increasingly willing to direct business travelers to Rhode Island's T.F. Green Airport and New Hampshire's Manchester Airport, according to local experts.
Boston's ongoing "Big Dig" project, which promises easier access to Logan when completed later this decade, has had the immediate impact of disrupting the approach roads to the downtown airport, exacerbating Logan's already significant problems with congested ground traffic. As a result, area companies have shown "much less resistance to traveling from Providence or Manchester" over the past year or so, according to Alan Kawadler, president of the Westboro, Mass.-based Business Travel Buying Group.
The trend applies to firms headquartered downtown, as well as those inside Boston's Route 128 beltway, said Kawadler. He said the presence of low-fare carriers, such as Southwest and MetroJet at T.F. Green and Manchester, attracts the cost-conscious employees at the many technology startups and pre-IPO firms in the Route 128 corridor.
Gary Polito, president of the New England Business Travelers Association, said his employer, Bose Corp., has increased its use of T.F. Green--located about 60 miles south of Boston in the Providence suburb of Warwick, R.I.--more than 200 percent in the past year. And with a recent increase in jet service, Polito predicts Manchester--located 50 miles to the north of Boston--"will be just like Providence in the next few years." Bose recently installed American Express's AXI online booking tool, and has been encouraging--although not insisting--that employees explore the low-fare alternatives to Logan. Polito said the trends indicate that education about the combination of convenience and cost-savings at Green and Manchester has paid off.
Patti Goldstein, manager of public relations for the Rhode Island Airport Corp., which manages T.F. Green, said recent parking lot surveys indicate that about half of travelers flying out of the airport are from Massachusetts. The modern, expanded passenger terminal at T.F. Green, completed in 1996, includes a number of amenities developed in response to surveys of business travelers, said Goldstein, including valet parking, a business center equipped with copiers, faxes, phones, a meeting room and an elegant restaurant suitable for business meals, the Federal Tavern.
More importantly, the arrival of Southwest in 1997 has spurred competition among carriers such as Continental, Delta and US Airways, resulting in fares that are sometimes one-third of those at Logan. Goldstein said Green had 130 daily flights and 5 million passengers in 1999.
The Providence-area airport's fares to the West Coast are especially attractive, said Polito. He added that he now uses Green himself, noting that the 50-mile drive from his home in Framingham, Mass., to congestion-free Green frequently is quicker than the often-torturous 20-mile trip to Logan.
Like Green, Manchester Airport has grown exponentially in recent years, and increasingly is reaching out to travelers in the Boston area, according to assistant airport director J. Brian O'Neill. Manchester averaged 54 daily jet flights in 1999, up from just 18 in 1998, and the airport's passenger load has increased from 1.1 million in 1997 to 2.8 million in 1999.
About 10 percent of passengers hail from the Bay State, according to survey data. "Our fastest growing group of customers is from the northern Massachusetts area," said O'Neill. Northern Massachusetts always has been within Manchester's market area, said O'Neill. By meeting the demands of that market, the airport is helping to take some of the pressure off Logan. "I wouldn't say we're stealing from Logan, we're recapturing our own travelers instead of them having to use somebody else's airport."
O'Neill added that while Manchester can provide better fares for flights that pass through regional hubs, Logan remains the primary departure point for international and nonstop flights to the West Coast. "When the Big Dig is over, I think Logan will be a great airport, and Manchester will be too," he said. "I don't think we'll lose those passengers we've recaptured to a redeveloped Logan.