tkrad

Any news or speculation that Southwest may start flying out of Paine Field when it opens for commercial flights next year? United and Alaska have both announced plans to fly there. I usually fly Alaska or Southwest so this would be great to have both as options.

tatterdema

I would be great, but does not look to happen. It is already at max, no room for another carrier.

sdsearch

Are you sure they're flying mainline planes there and not regional jets (which Southwest doesn't have)?

Also, when's the last time Southwest added an airport that small? Alaska and United don't mind adding an airport from which they'll have only 3 or 4 or 5 flights a day, but that's not the Southwest way. Southwest has a minimum number of flights (it used to be around 8 or 9 years ago) that they want an airport to support before they'll consider starting service there. That's part of the difference between their low-operating-cost model and the legacy hub-and-spoke model that legacies like United and Alaska operate under.

smmrfld

LGB started with 4x daily.

N830MH

Right, no room for another airline. Sorry! Right now, only they have Alaska & United Airlines.

tkrad

I don't think they have reached the 24 flights a day limit for that Airport yet??? The news report mentioned there could be a third Airline but didn't elaborate.
Two years ago Allegiant expressed interest but backed out when they couldn't have sole control over the Terminal. Ever since United announced, there has been no other news. I hope they haven't reached capacity yet.

Paine Field is an easy 20-25 minute drive for me, while SeaTac is 1-2 hours or more depending on traffic.

tatterdema

The are flying 737's as well as regional.

I am at about the half way mark, but it would be much easier for me to hit PAE instead of driving through the city, at least during certain times of day.+

From the Seattle Times:
With typical turn times, the terminal’s two gates mean a peak capacity of roughly 16 passenger flights per day, or 32 takeoffs and landings. operate almost at full capacity as soon as it opens next year.


The planned services by Alaska and United combined should almost fully occupy the two airport gates planned at the new terminal.

With typical turn times, the terminal’s two gates mean a peak capacity of roughly 16 passenger flights per day, or 32 takeoffs and landings.

“As far as capacity goes we are getting pretty close,” said Propeller Chief Executive Brett Smith. “Our focus is now entirely on getting the terminal built and open.”

joshua362

I want a title like Propeller Chief!

tatterdema

Lol, Propeller is the name of the company, he is the Chief Executive of it. Does sound funny though.

ryw

I feel like LGB is a special case - the physical terminal is small, but the airport sees ~2.5 million passengers/year and is basically a SoCal hub for JetBlue and has enough traffic for WN to have interest in providing service from there.

ucdtim17

A foot in the door, with the potential for many more flights should B6 give up and bail entirely, which is a real possibility

Justin026

To be clear, there is no limit on commercial flights at Paine Field. That would violate FAA regulations and Federal pre-emption would overrule any local restrictions. The Seattle Times' recent article, which suggested otherwise, has been corrected.

There is a practical limit owing to the fact there are only 2 gates in the new terminal.

sdsearch

In other words, Southwest can start flights from there anytime they want, as long as they first pay for expanding the terminal to have more gates.

joshua362

Maybe they can do what they did at ISP, build a huge 8 gate monolith for themselves only to cutback the schedule to 12 operations daily!

Toshbaf

Paine Field is nearing capacity even before the terminal is built. AS has announced 9 flights and UA 6 flights. There will be 2 gates. That leaves about 2-3 flights left. I don't know if Southwest is willing to have its plane park in a remote stand and have passengers bused in or if they are allowed to walk to the plane.

Paine Field should alter its plans to have 3-4 gates but there's opposition to even 2 gates.