Air Service is a Hit so Far

By KAT HUGHES

A month after more than 100 hopeful onlookers gathered at Columbia Regional Airport on Aug. 19 to celebrate Mesaba Airlines’ first flight from Columbia to Memphis, much of the fanfare is gone, but one thing remains: passengers, and more of them than the airport has had in awhile.

During its first 30 days of service, Mesaba took 1,097 passengers to Memphis, which beats the previous carrier’s monthly passenger average by 220 percent.

Mesaba, a subsidiary of Northwest Airlines, took over Columbia’s federally subsidized essential air service after Air Midwest, a subsidiary of Mesa Air, stopped service to Kansas City for financial reasons June 30.

Mesaba Airlines operates three roundtrip flights per day from Columbia to Memphis, with the exception of Sunday, when it operates two flights.

Public Works spokeswoman Jill Stedem said the airline has booked an average of 50 percent of its seats during the month of September. The airline sold out its first flight the first weekend of September.

Northwest spokeswoman Kristin Baur said the airline has been pleased with the service so far, and it expects its initial success to continue. "The projected bookings on hand lead us to believe that flight loads are strong after the start-up period," Baur said.

Local officials said they are excited about the new service because it takes passengers to a hub, where they can connect with 91 nonstop destinations and six nonstop international destinations.

Stedem said the hub service is key for Columbia Regional to start competing with Kansas City and St. Louis for passengers, and the city will continue to work with Northwest Airlines to market the airport and let people know that Columbia is becoming an increasingly competitive option for air travel.

Stedem said the new Web site, www.flymidmo.com, will launch in a couple weeks. It will have features such as arrival and departure updates, fare watches and a flight comparison calculator that will compute the differences between flying out of Columbia and traveling to St. Louis or Kansas City to catch flights, including the costs of mileage and parking.

In the fiscal 2009 budget, the city has also dedicated $50,000 from the Convention and Visitors Bureau’s fund to help continue marketing and promoting airport service. "We have put quite a bit of effort into announcing the new service, but now we need to keep it in the forefront so people start to look at Columbia as their first option for air travel," said Lorah Steiner, CVB director.

The Columbia Chamber of Commerce has also urged its members to try the new service and has heard positive reviews, said Don Laird, chamber president.

"I think a lot of interest has been generated, people are checking it out, and we’ve had pretty positive feedback," Laird said. "The only negative we’ve heard is some pricing to certain locations, but we’re hoping that as service continues, that will work itself out."

Reach Kat Hughes at (573) 815-1713 or kchughes@tribmail.com.

Originally published by KAT HUGHES of the Tribune’s staff.

(c) 2008 Columbia Daily Tribune. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.