Labor Day travel down, yet planes will be full

U.S. airlines will carry 16 million passengers during the eight-day Labor Dayperiod, a 3.5 percent drop from a year earlier. And airlines already are offering discount fares for Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's travel.

That's good news for bargain-hunting travelers, but signal growing desperation among U.S. airlines that saw revenues drop 21 percent in July versus July 2008, according to the Air Transport Association of America.

The global recession continues to cut domestic and international travel, and about 1 million fewer passengers will fly from Sept. 2-9 than a year earlier, said the ATA.

Full planes

While fewer people are flying, full planes will be more common because U.S. airlines pulled at least 500 aircraft from service since the start of 2008 to better match capacity with sagging sales.

"Passengers should expect airports to be less crowded, but planes will be at or near capacity this Labor Day holiday," ATA President James May said.

For travel after Labor Day, watch for fare sales.

"Everybody is fighting for your buck," said Tom Parsons of Bestfares.com, a discount travel Web site.

But Parsons takes exception with the tactics of one airline that has joined the discount fare war: Southwest Airlines. When Southwest unveiled its "Fall Savings" deals — one-way fares from $59 to $109 for flights between Sept. 9 and Jan. 7 — it included some small-print exceptions that Parsons insist should have been more clear.

The deals included blackout dates from Nov. 24 to Dec. 1 and Dec. 18 to Jan. 4. That's 26 blackout days clustered around all the major fall and winter holidays.