Shuttle America Expands Regional Service In Boston
<B>Shuttle America Expands Regional Service In Boston</B>
By Robert Curley
Travelers to Boston have yet another alternative to braving the notorious traffic and "Big Dig" construction associated with Logan International Airport: Shuttle America now is offering multiple daily flights from Hanscom Field in nearby Bedford, Mass., to Buffalo, N.Y., Trenton, N.J., and Greensboro, N.C., with additional service to LaGuardia Airport in New York slated to begin in September.
Shuttle America is the only commercial carrier serving Hanscom, a primarily general-aviation airport located about 15 miles from downtown Boston. The airline launched its regional service in September 1999 with a total of just four daily departures; Shuttle America now flies its 50-seat, Bombardier Dash-8-300 turboprops nine times daily to Buffalo Niagara International Airport, 10 times daily to Trenton/Mercer County Airport (serving the greater Philadelphia area), and five times daily to Piedmont Triad International Airport in Greensboro, N.C.
Pending final Federal Aviation Administration approval, which is expected, Shuttle America also will launch five daily flights to LaGuardia on Sept. 12 and expand that to seven flights daily on Oct. 1, according to Mark Cestari, vice president of marketing and communications for the airline. About half of Shuttle America's customers are business travelers, said Cestari. Outbound customers are frequently residents of communities located north and west of the city looking for an alternative to Logan, while inbound clients are often headed to the Route 128 technology corridor, located just minutes from Hanscom Field.
Free parking and easy access to the airport are big sellers for Shuttle America, Cestari said. So are cheap airfares: Built on the Southwest Airlines model, Shuttle America offers fixed fares on all its flights. A one-way, 14-day advanced purchase ticket to Greensboro, for example, is $79, and while bigger airlines might match that with special deals, they're unlikely to touch the walk-up fare of $159 for the same flight. "Our regular fares are typically 40 percent to 50 percent less than our competitors," which appeals to small business owners and employees on a tight travel budget, said Cestari. "We're actually stimulating a lot of travel that wouldn't happen otherwise."
Shuttle America currently is carrying about 15,000 passengers monthly via Hanscom, and future plans call for adding routes as far west as Chicago and as far south as the Carolinas, according to Cestari. Candidates for added service include Detroit, Columbus, Ohio, and "other places where there isn't good existing service, that have high fares, and where we can offer a real value based on what Southwest and others are doing," he said.
Aviation authorities in Massachusetts say that Hanscom easily can handle 123,000 more takeoffs and landings annually. But despite Shuttle America's apparent success and desire for growth, operations at Hanscom likely will remain focused largely on general aviation. The resumption of commercial flights at the airport after a 10-year absence has drawn strong local criticism and threats of lawsuits and legislative intervention, and Cestari stressed that Shuttle America plans to remain a "niche operation" at Hanscom.
Furthermore, Massport, the governmental agency that oversees Hanscom and most other airports in the Commonwealth, is focusing on expanding utilization of other, larger regional facilities, such as Worcester International Airport, rather than smaller airports like Hanscom. In February, for example, Delta began twice-daily flights from Worcester to Atlanta and has reported that these flights have been 73 percent full on average, according to Massport. Also, American Eagle began flying from Worcester to New York JFK earlier this month, according to Massport spokesman Jose Juves.