Mexicana to Cut Flights Out of PDX
By Mike Rogoway, The Oregonian, Portland, Ore.
Jun. 17–The rising fuel prices hobbling airlines claimed their first major casualties at Portland International Airport on Monday as Mexicana Airlines announced it will stop flights from PDX to Guadalajara and Mexico City on Sept. 2.
Mexicana began serving Portland in 2003 when it launched the Guadalajara route, which grew from three to seven days a week. The airline added Mexico City flights a year ago this month, citing demographic and economic studies that suggested a big opportunity in the region.
But those studies apparently didn’t factor in high oil prices, which have further eroded airlines’ precarious financial position this year. Mexicana said Monday that its Portland routes no longer pencil out.
“This difficult decision was taken after a thorough profitability analysis of these routes, which without a doubt have been affected by the high cost of fuel prices, and the general crisis that the aviation industry is experiencing,” the airline said in a statement.
On Monday, the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics reported that the nation’s seven largest air carriers had operating losses totaling $1.3 billion in the first three months of the year.
The seven carriers spent 29.4 percent of their operating expenses on fuel, compared with 13.8 percent in the first quarter five years ago.
Steve Johnson, spokesman for Portland International Airport, said that PDX hasn’t lost many flights yet and doesn’t expect to this summer. But he said the airport expects at least a few domestic routes to be cut this fall.
Alaska Airlines serves two Mexican tourist destinations, Cabo San Lucas and Puerto Vallarta, with seasonal flights. And Portland travelers can still reach Guadalajara and Mexico City on Mexicana connecting routes from four California cities.
But Lila Quiroz, co-owner of Salvador’s Bakery in Woodburn, said she hates to lose the nonstop flights.
“I was going to go visit my mother-in-law, and I have a 3-year-old, so I was definitely looking for the shortest route,” she said. “As business owners, we don’t have a lot of time to do (long) layovers.”
In 2006, before Mexicana began its PDX-Mexico City service, the airline carried more than 56,000 passengers between Portland and Guadalajara. That was a one-year increase of 25 percent. The airline said 85 percent of its passengers were traveling to see families.
Mexicana’s steady expansion of its Portland routes over the past five years illustrates the demand for flights to Mexico, said Gale Castillo, president of the Hispanic Metropolitan Chamber in Portland.
“Now, the pricing is another issue,” she said. “They were competing, in essence, against the bus systems” that offer slow, but economical, trips.
Oregon’s Hispanic population grew by nearly 40 percent from 2000 to 2006, according to the most recent U.S. Census data.
The loss of the Mexico City routes leaves PDX with Alaska’s seasonal routes to Mexico and direct service to four other foreign cities: Northwest Airlines’ flights to Tokyo and Amsterdam; Lufthansa’s flights to Frankfurt; and Horizon and Air Canada flights to Vancouver, B.C.
Johnson, the airport spokesman, said none of those appears to be in jeopardy.
“Our estimation is the other international routes are healthy,” he said.
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