Originally Posted by
MSPeconomist
I think of Altoona as being far from State College, so it wound never occur to me to fly to Altoona when I'm really heading for State College/University Park. In fact, I would prefer to fly into Harrisburg, which had some mainline service when I last did this, IIRC NW/DL through DTW.
Altoona is closer to State College than it used to be. No, neither city moved. With the advent of I-99 it is now a quick 40 minute drive, all highway except the last mile to SCE. Prior to the highway, the drive took over an hour. Now people in Altoona regularly drive to State College to go to Trader Joe's, Wegman's or to eat Thai food. People in State College go to Altoona for shopping. Many people commute from one to the other for daily work, including the friend I am visiting at the moment. If you think about it, a forty minute daily commute is considered average in Atlanta.
If you wanted to fly next week, r/t ATL-XXX-AOO, there WED, back FRI, it costs $150 r/t. ATL-XXX-SCE is $566. ATL-XXX-MDT is $501. The difference is staggering: $415 vs SCE, $351 vs MDT, using Skyscanner's lowest fares for each destination. It would be worth the slightly longer ride if you were going to State College, not to mention rental cars are less expensive in AOO because of the costs for the rental companies to operate in each airport and the airport rental car taxes. The irony is it had been so expensive to fly into AOO that I had stopped checking for those flights until earlier this week when someone told me to check flying into AOO.
I have flown into MDT before but the drive to Altoona or State College is mostly on twisting, hilly back roads. Either drive is two hours according to Mapquest and my memory of doing those drives often when I lived in Philly.