hobo13

Just returned from my second business trip to the Palmdale area in the past 3 months. Both times we flew to LAX and drove -- PMD was never even considered due to the poor connecting options to the east coast.

My understanding, however, is that the rental car companies close early at PMD anyway. Until you can fly in on the evening flight and get a car, I don't see how they are going to get a lot of business pax.

notquiteaff

I flew into PMD on a Friday night in April (arrived at 9:20pm or so) and the Hertz guy showed up to give me my car (there was one other pax who had arrived on my flight with a car reservation). No problem, other than that he was maybe 5 mins late (maybe our flight was a bit early... don't really recall). You can check the Hertz website for their opening hours; they pretty much wrap around the flight schedule.

PDXPremier

I think you hit the nail on the head, it's probably being subsidized in one way or another...I think Chico (CIC) is in the same situation since it's cheaper to fly one-way from PDX-CIC than any other city in California with the sometimes exception of SMF...and with UAX being the only carrier in CIC (as is the case with PMD), you would think the fares would be sky high but they aren't

espostor

Pretty sure CIC isn't being subsidized, but I could be wrong. There was a ~$400k DOT grant for study (read: city officials lobbying airlines) and subsidy of new routes (CIC-LAX and CIC-PDX via SkyWest or Horizon were suggestions tossed around in airport commission meetings) for 2006-07, I believe, but no subsidies for the existing CIC-SFO route, AFAIK.

Competitively-priced fares into and out of CIC seem to track with competition from WN, AS, B6, and others out of SMF, e.g. there were a couple of weeks this winter where a CIC-PHL r/t could be had for $183 all-in -- a match of WN's west coast-PHL sale. My guess is that during shoulder seasons, UA and SkyWest will sometimes match (or come close to matching) CIC-PDX with AS's SMF-PDX, which is where you see the cheap PDX-CIC fares.

(Heck, even right now at near-peak season, it's only about $50 more to go CIC-PDX on UA instead of SMF-PDX on AS/QX. That extra $50 is easily recouped by not having to drive the 180 mile r/t to SMF and pay parking.)

One thing to note about the PMD service vs. the CIC service is that the risk on the PMD-SFO flights is totally absorbed by United -- it pays SkyWest a flat fee to operate and United keeps or eats the ticket revenue (or lack thereof). As mentioned in other threads, all flights numbered 57xx (like CIC-SFO and SJC-SBA) are "at-risk" -- United and SkyWest share the revenues.

N751PR

As a part of the handful of PMD local (yes, we do exist ), I'm looking forward to this! Due to inconvenient connection times with the current schedule (12 hours in SFO in between my flight from NRT and the 2nd PMD flight?!), I usually just fly out of LAX. Now looks like I may be flying out of PMD more often in the future with the new frequencies. ^

kaszeta

Same here. I'm an occasional semi-local (I'm often on TDY to Edwards for weeks at a time), and while I fly in and out of Burbank and LAX to get to Palmdale from the East Coast, if I need to go someplace while I'm there, it's a very cheap and convenient airport. Particularly for weekend trips to SFO.

PHLGovFlyer

Interesting point about the federal flight contracts to PMD. I'm headed there in early July and our travel system doesn't even recognize "PMD" as a valid destination airport. I ended up booking to LAX and I'll drive it. I'm hoping that the new GSA city pairs that come out in October will improve the situation. Also, the increased frequencies and better times should make east coast connections a lot more agreeable ^

PHLGovFlyer

The GSA has issued the FY2009 city pair contracts and PMD-SFO is on the list. Unfortunately, its at $439 one way as a Y fare . There are no non-Y fares listed.

So I can go 2500+ miles PHL-SFO for $215 (one way, full Y fare) and then the last few hundred miles to PMD for more than double that. It makes the entire round trip over $1300

PDXPremier

CIC, however, is sometimes cheaper than PDX-SMF and ALWAYS cheaper than PDX-MOD (MOD being roughly the same distance from SMF as CIC so why doesn't the SMF fare match rule apply to MOD?)...Odd...Also, CIC, unlike SMF, seems more immune to the typical fare hike around the holidays...

HkCaGu

These are all the PMD fares GSA awarded for FY 2009 (YCA/XCA):

PMD-IAD $1050/$875 (LAX-IAD $196/$179)
PMD-SFO $439/NA (LAX-SFO $69/$59)
PMD-DAY $784/$244 (LAX-DAY $174/$125)
PMD-MCO $825/$687 (LAX-MCO $285/$178)
PMD-SEA $573/$478 (LAX-SEA $99/NA)

So looks like the only fare that makes sense is DAY (XCA), which is only $119 above LAX. All other fares are at least $370 more expensive--more expensive than an extra day of car rental, meal and lodging per diem combined!

So let me think. Someone in UA decided to switch PMD from CRJ to EMB, double the frequency and increase capacity by 20% in anticipation of getting a GSA contract. Someone else in UA submitted PMD bids (in reality they're not bids, since nobody is competing) at outrageous prices compare to what they put in for LAX (which are real bids).

HkCaGu

Instead of the 50-seat bus contracted to AVTA by L.A. County (in reality, Supervisor Antonovich), the "Palmdale Flyer" is now a smaller vehicle (well, it can't be bigger than the plane!) contracted to a company in the San Gabriel Valley. The bus will theoretically meet and greet all 4 flights, but one has to reserve 24 hours ahead. It's still free though.

And there is still no transportation between PMD and the hub of transportation in Palmdale, the PTC (Metrolink, AVTA, Amtrak Bus, Greyhound, Park and Ride).

OskiBear

For people living in the Antelope Valley, how viable is flying in/out of Inyokern(IYK) airport?

It's somewhat further than LAX or BUR but a straight shot up the 14 w/o traffic.

I drive to Mammoth frequently in the winter to ski and have always wondered about IYK.

HkCaGu

The midpoint on a drive between LAX and IYK (150 miles) is Avenue K which is a mile or two south of Downtown Lancaster.

The IYK flights (3/day) are mainly to serve the China Lake base population. I've always wondered why they can't just "intercept" the flight to serve PMD. LAX-PMD-IYK would cost maybe an extra 20 minutes that captive IYK passengers won't/can't mind. Maybe they can fill all the LAX-IYK seats already and have no seats to spare.

bhmlurker

Some small airports have free parking, and this more than makes up for the increase in fare. CLD (Carlsbad/Palomar) in north county San Diego operates this way. If one is flying out for 5 days, parking can easily be 50-75 dollars, not to mention the round-trip gas and wear/tear on the car to the airport.

SFOtoORD

Aren't some of the LAX-XXX prices due to the fact that VX submitted some ridiculously bids this year?