MKE sets another passenger record
 

Mitchell airport has set another passenger record for January. The competition between Midwest/Republic, AirTran and Southwest is really paying off for passengers and the airport itself.

Traffic is up 43% compared to January 2009.

http://www.wispolitics.com/1006/0308...ll_flights.pdf

Granted, last year was way down, but Mitchell is rebounding much faster than many other airports, primarily due to the heated fare wars affecting many MKE routes.

Even if you go back to 2008...well before Midwest's big 2008 cutbacks...this year's traffic was up over 100,000...nearly 17%...from that record year. January is normally the weakest month at Mitchell.

Another way in which this is remarkable: Milwaukee's traffic surpassed Memphis, Kansas City, and Cincinnati in the month:

697,495 ….. Milwaukee
689,084 ….. Memphis
676,702 ….. Kansas City
656,364 ….. Cincinnati
647,707 ….. Houston Hobby
635,931 ….. Nashville
628,979 ….. Raleigh
610,026 ….. Austin
581,733 ….. San Jose
576,677 ….. Pittsburgh
574,032 ….. Dallas Love
533,134 ….. Indianapolis
472,710 ….. Albuquerque
449,827 ….. Columbus

As reported in another thread, the Q4 Republic call said the MKE operation load factor for January was about 10 points higher than last year. We don't know if other airlines did as well (or perhaps better) when it comes to load factor in January, but clearly the overall traffic numbers show good response to capacity growth here.

Impressive to say the least. I think the Southwest coming to MKE has made a huge difference for all involved. I don't want to take away from AirTran's thunder, but even they admit that Southwest has a huge following in the Chicagoland region. I also saw a few hints dropped on airliners.net that Midwest will be anouncing new routes soon. We will have to see if it pans out or not.

Very much anecdotal, but in the Southwest gate area there seems to be a larger number of Chicago-linked passengers than I commonly see...things like Bears jerseys, or Cubs hats, or fire department jackets from N Illinois. And the last time I parked in remote, I stood next two two ladies from the Chicago are (who were strangers) talking specifically about using MKE for Southwest instead of MDW.

Obviously not scientific or necessarily representative, but for what it's worth. Southwest brings a certain level of credibility to Milwaukee that nobody else can. It's also worth remember that Southwest has a whole lot of loyal flyers who for years have been conditioned to consider alternate airports (Manchester for Boston, for example). A WN flyer in Phoenix coming to Chicago is likely to consider Milwaukee as a viable alternative now.

^ Thanks Air Tran. ^ Thanks Southwest

WISN TV in Milwaukee covered the story on last night's news and showed old footage of taxiing aircraft at MKE. No, this time they did not show old Republic Airlines aircraft; they ran old footage of taxiing Midwest Express planes. :td:

They showed the same old old-Republic footage just a couple of weeks ago.