Some airlines add new routes as others make cuts

Los Angeles Times

LOS ANGELES — The economy remains sluggish, but some airlines are expanding services and celebrating at 30,000 feet in the air.

Virgin America, the 2-year-old airline based in San Francisco, said this week that it will add nonstop flights from California to Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport in Florida. The airline will begin Nov. 18 with two daily nonstop flights from Los Angeles International Airport and two from San Francisco International Airport.

Not to be outdone, JetBlue Airways announced on the same day that it would also add daily nonstop service from San Francisco to Fort Lauderdale, beginning Nov. 17. JetBlue has been running a daily nonstop between Long Beach Airport in Southern California and Fort Lauderdale since 2003.

What's the logic in adding routes when demand is shrinking?

David Cush, Virgin America's chief executive, said the new service to Fort Lauderdale has been in the pipeline for at least two years, long before the economy took a nose dive. He added that the new airline hopes to benefit from "economies of scale" by eventually increasing to 40 to 50 planes, almost twice as many as it has now.

Besides, he said, he believes when the economy rebounds, Virgin America will be in a strong position.

"We are quite confident in this market," he said.

Volaris, the 3-year-old Mexican airline, also added new flights this summer, connecting Los Angeles International Airport to Toluca and Guadalajara, Mexico.

To promote the service, the airline pulled three rows of seats from a flight from Toluca International Airport to Los Angeles to clear space for an airborne concert by Los Tigres Del Norte, the Grammy-award winning band from Mexico. The passengers included winners of a trivia contest hosted by Mexican television channel, Bandamax.

At a news conference at The Grammy Museum in Los Angeles after the flight, band front man Jorge Hernandez said the group played for about an hour and 40 minutes until the batteries for the amplifiers were exhausted. After that, they sang a cappella over the plane's intercom system.

Elsewhere in the airline industry, there were signs that a full-blown recovery has yet to arrive.

American Airlines announced this week plans to drop all of its American Eagle commuter flights from Southern California's Orange County to the San Francisco Bay Area by Aug. 25.

The cut in service includes seven daily flights between John Wayne Airport and Mineta San Jose International Airport and five daily flights from John Wayne to San Francisco International Airport.

"Our entire capacity cuts are driven by the very deep recession we are in," said American spokesman Tim Smith.