DL is now Official Gone from TOL
 

The writing has been on the wall for awhile now, effective March 13, 2011, DL is pulling out of TOL.

It is cutting the 1 lone remaining flight to MSP.


http://www.wtol.com/Global/story.asp?S=14077677

No surprises there. TOL is doomed as a passenger facility.

Any reason why you see TOL's prospects significantly different from, say, Flint's? FNT has DL to DTW, MSP, and ATL; AA to ORD; F9 to MKE; and FL to ATL, TPA, MCO and RSW.

Yep and there is more news in the coming days in regards to another loss at TOL....

FNT has much better prospects for several reasons and still continues to do well despite some challenges in the local/state/regional/national economy.

1) Larger catchment area
FNT pulls people in from the Northern suburbs of Detroit, greater Flint area, Port Huron/Sarnia, poaches passengers from LAN & MBS, plus even gets people that drive down from Northern Michigan in search of lower fares
2) Farther away from DTW
TOL was simply too close to DTW, an generally relatively easy, all-interstate drive between the two. For most people it is a 40-60 drive to the plethora of nonstop at competitive prices out of DTW versus a nearly mandatory connection out of TOL. FNT is farther and the drive can be more congestion prone. The fact that one can get to other hubsites is huge

3) Better marketing.
FNT has a very progressive airport administration, the same can't be said for TOL

This is not exactly a good comparison because of population differences but FLL and MIA airports are only 25 miles apart and FLL has over the past 30 years expanded with alot of new service with new airlines. So why can't TOL have some service at least to the hubs. DL had served ATL from TOL at one time.

Volume of population in the MIA/FLL and to an extent PBI make any comparison very difficult.

Overall FLL , has cruise ships which draw a lot of people, plus the city is growing, yes it has slowed down recently, but it is not getting smaller.

So I guess American Airlines is now the official airline of the Toledo Mud Hens?

What cities have lost all their scheduled airline service the past 10 years.

YNG Youngstown, Ohio lost it's all it's air service some years ago, I think one airline flies to MCO a few days a week. UA served both TOL and YNG at one time.

The time/distance argument isn't compelling. I've made the drives. Bing maps puts TOL-DTW at 1:05 and FNT-DTW (also all Interstate) at 1:09.

Yes, it's nice that FNT has service to other destinations but that's an outcome, not a cause.

Then it must be about profit, huh? Who would have thought it.

TOL is further hurt by being 10 miles west-southwest of downtown. The mass of Metro Toledo is much closer than that 1:05 time.

Also, given that location, there is really NO portion of Michigan that is better served (in terms of transit time to airport) by TOL vs. DTW.

Meanwhile, FNT is a SERIOUS competitor (in terms of ease of access to the airport) for a significant portion of metro Detroit (anything north of M-59; despite Metro Detroit's general malaise, these areas are growing).

Switching to MSP was a last ditch effort to make things work. But DOT data shows that in November (first month of the nonstop to MSP) the load factor was just 36%. Thats not very good economics for a 500+ mi RJ route.

Amazingly, the peak of service for TOL in the last decade was 2003 when TOL had: AA(ORD), CO (CLE), DL (ATL,CVG), NW (DTW), TZ (MDW) and US (PIT). Amazing how the airline industry changes in less than 10 years.