Airline Riders

Frontier Airlines, the Denver-based low-fare carrier, will announce today that it will launch service between Rapid City and Denver, Frontier spokesman Joe Hodas confirmed Monday. Hodas said service would begin Oct. 5, and the new carrier will offer two flights a day seven days a week to Frontier's Denver hub. He said other details, including fares and schedules, would be released today. Rapid City is one of three cities notified Monday that Frontier will add them to its schedule. The others are Wichita, Kan., and Sioux City, Iowa. Last winter, Frontier invited as many as 50 mid-sized cities within a 1,200-mile radius of Denver to submit proposals.


The Frontier routes were coveted by airport managers throughout the region. Its low-fare business model, pioneered by Southwest Airlines, brings lower fares, even among traditional carriers, to the markets where they set up. Some cities even offered cash subsidies to lure Frontier. Sioux Falls, for instance, offered $250,000 in revenue guarantees. A consultant in Sioux Falls told airport officials there that fares could drop by 30 percent if Frontier enters the market. It's unclear, at least for now, whether Frontier's entry in to the Rapid City market will have such a dramatic effect on overall fares.

Mason Short, Rapid City Regional Airport's executive director, said Monday that Rapid City's package included no cash subsidy or revenue guarantees.

Currently, the only incentives Rapid City offers to airlines are marketing agreements through the Rapid City Air Service Task Force and partners such as the South Dakota Department of Tourism and the Rapid City Convention & Visitors Bureau. Short believes it was the Rapid City market itself that lured Frontier to town.

"I think it was twofold: The tremendous outdoor recreation and attractions that are here, and the tremendous amount of demand for air service in Rapid City," he said. Rapid City has higher-than-average load factors despite higher-than-average fares, Short said.

"I think that made the market ripe for lower-fare competition," he said. Denver is currently the biggest destination for air travel from Rapid City Regional Airport. In May, the United Express carrier ferried more than 17,500 passengers to and from Denver. Meanwhile Northwest Airlines transported about 15,500 passengers to and from Minneapolis-St. Paul.

SkyWest, operating as a DeltaConnection carrier to the Delta Airlines hub in Salt Lake City, had 5,500 passengers in May. And Allegiant Air's route to Las Vegas carried 2,000 passengers. Frontier Airlines began service on July 5, 1994, with 180 employees and two Boeing 737s on routes from Denver to North Dakota cities of Bismarck, Fargo, Grand Forks and Minot.

Since then, it has grown to be the second-largest carrier out of Denver International Airport, with an average of 250 daily departures and arrivals to 57 cities in the United States, Canada, Mexico and Central America.


source:http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/