Airlines abandon small cities By Barbara De Lollis and Barbara Hansen, USA TODAY Since the Sept. 11 attacks, Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport in Ohio has= =20 become a ghost town. In the past year, the airport that serves this former= =20 steel town in northeastern Ohio went from handling 4,000 commercial airline= =20 passengers a month to none. Regional carriers for US Airways and Northwest= =20 left the market. In the two years before the attacks, Continental Express=20 had flown away, and United Express had shut down. Northwest's exit last=20 month was especially tough, casting a cloud over an airport that had just=20 been overhauled. In the last five years, $50 million in federal money has=20 been spent to double the size of its terminal, triple the number of=20 passenger gates and expand the runway for wide-body jets. The airport even= =20 got a highway interchange. But airlines are more interested in survival=20 than money-losing markets, and Youngstown was costing Northwest $100,000 a= =20 month after the attacks. Under enormous pressure to cut costs, the nation's major airlines are=20 retreating from airports in small and midsize cities that are mostly served= =20 by turboprop planes. Nine other small airports across the USA have lost all= =20 commercial airline service since Sept. 11 of last year, a USA TODAY=20 analysis shows. Service in about a dozen other communities has been cut by= =20 at least 50%. Scores more are vulnerable. The smallest half of the nation's= =20 airports are hard hit, because some travelers are driving instead of flying= =20 on shorter trips, and others are choosing to drive farther to reach an=20 airport served by Southwest or another low-fare carrier. For more than 200= =20 of the smallest airports in the continental USA, domestic scheduled flights= =20 this month are down 17% from what had been scheduled for last October=20 (before Sept. 11), compared with a 10% drop at the rest of the nation's=20 airports, according to the analysis of Official Airline Guide schedules=20 provided by Back Aviation Solutions. Many small airports, such as Las Cruces, N.M., had already begun to lose=20 service: In the past five years, flights at these airports have dropped=20 about 30%, the analysis shows. Some of the smallest airports were only able= =20 to keep planes coming mainly because of federal subsidies. The situation is= =20 likely to worsen. Airlines are retiring more turboprops and laying off more= =20 workers. There is mounting pressure in Washington to revamp the subsidy=20 program and possibly eliminate incentives at airports where a larger=20 airport is within about an hour's drive. A community now can get subsidies= =20 if it is more than 70 miles away from a medium or large hub airport and if= =20 the service costs less than $200 per passenger. Nearly 200 smaller airports= =20 are served by a single carrier, posing more risk if that carrier makes=20 deeper cuts, aviation consultants say. Still, Youngstown residents are=20 luckier than some. They can drive to three airports =97 Pittsburgh,= Cleveland=20 or Akron-Canton, Ohio =97 within about an hour and a half. "You could say, 'What's so bad about that?' " says sales executive Stewart= =20 Yang. "But if you're catching a 6:30 a.m. flight and you have a 1 =BD-hour= =20 drive and you have to be there 1 =BD hours beforehand, suddenly you're=20 leaving at 3 a.m." Among other small cities that have lost all commercial service: =B7 Ruidoso, N.M. After the Sept. 11 attacks, only about 20 people= were=20 flying every month out of this resort community in the southern Rocky=20 Mountains. Rio Grande Air, a small Taos-based airline that flies nine-seat= =20 single-engine turboprops, stopped serving the town last month. Despite a=20 subsidy, it was losing $30,000 a month. "After 9/11, boardings just=20 dropped off," says Rio Grande Air CEO Timothy Wooldridge. Area residents=20 now drive nearly 3 1/2 hours to Albuquerque or 2 1/2 hours to El Paso.=20 Skiers who come from as far as Dallas and Houston, 700 to 800 miles away,=20 still prefer to drive. When Roy Parker, general manager of a ski resort in= =20 Ruidoso, travels, he flies his own plane to Albuquerque, then catches a=20 flight. "The fares are so cheap," he says. "This weekend, I'm going to=20 Lexington, Ky., and the ticket was only $200." =B7 Ottumwa, Iowa. A year ago, Great Lakes Aviation, then a United=20 Express carrier, pulled out of this southeastern Iowa city of 25,000,=20 citing rising operating costs and more service in Des Moines. It was=20 Ottumwa's sole commercial airline. Today, Ottumwans must drive about 1 =BD= to=20 four hours to catch a flight from Des Moines, Omaha or Kansas City. Joy=20 Johnston, executive director of a local business development group, says=20 air service is key to her city's ability to recruit and retain businesses=20 such as food processor Cargill and farm equipment manufacturer Deere.=20 "While we have some great assets here, we also have this as a liability,"=20 she says. =B7 Hickory and Southern Pines, N.C. Mesa Airlines, a US Airways=20 regional carrier, pulled out of these towns after Sept. 11, having already= =20 been losing money for months. Local officials are trying to find a=20 replacement. Hickory, known for its furniture companies and mountain=20 resorts, also has two large fiber-optic cable companies and a growing=20 number of retirees. It's a 1 1/2-hour drive from Greensboro and about an=20 hour from Charlotte. The Pinehurst/Southern Pines area, a golfing mecca and= =20 retirement haven, is about an hour's drive from Raleigh/Durham. Golfers are= =20 increasingly hiring private jets to fly directly into Southern Pines. A lingering problem Sept. 11 exacerbated the situation, but small cities have had trouble=20 keeping air service for years. The challenge started when Congress=20 deregulated the airline industry in 1978. As a safety net, Congress=20 established the Essential Air Service program, which subsidizes air service= =20 to 114 smaller communities, the most in its history. The subsidies were=20 supposed to expire in 10 years, but Congress kept them. The Bush=20 administration is expected to propose changes to the subsidy program, which= =20 the General Accounting Office says is increasingly hard to make viable.=20 After Sept. 11, Congress nearly doubled its budget to $113 million in=20 anticipation of growing demand. But the investigative arm of Congress says= =20 costs at these airports have been going up and ridership dropping for at=20 least seven years. "Either Congress needs to provide substantially more funds or look at some= =20 options to streamline the program so that it provides service where it's=20 going to be used," says JayEtta Hecker, a GAO director who overseas=20 transportation issues. "Passengers don't say, 'Oh, I'd much rather fly from= =20 my local community.' They say, 'It costs me three times as much!' The=20 preference is far more driven by lower cost and more service options than=20 can possibly be supported by a local community." Plus, regional carriers=20 are retiring their 19-seat turboprops =97 long considered the cheapest way= to=20 serve routes under about 350 miles =97 and buying small jets, which have= more=20 seats, can fly longer routes and are preferred by passengers. The jets=20 don't make economic sense in some smaller markets, though, airline=20 executives say. Northwest still relies on 70 turboprops to serve its many=20 smaller communities, but this year, the airline's turboprop flights will be= =20 down 15%, while regional jet flying will be up 25%. "There's going to come a day when either your city is going to make the cut= =20 and be large enough to support jet service, or the city may lose service=20 altogether," says Jim Cron, a Northwest vice president. Turboprops have=20 been falling out of favor with manufacturers and carriers alike. Three=20 manufacturers make them for commercial airlines, compared with at least=20 eight makers five years ago. Bombardier, for example, delivered just three= =20 turboprops in the first nine months of this year compared with 11 in the=20 same period last year. Horizon Air, Alaska Airline's regional affiliate=20 that serves many smaller cities in the western USA, is the nation's only=20 carrier taking delivery of new turboprops =97 but those are larger 70-seat= =20 models from Bombardier that fly farther and faster. Airline executives say= =20 the government pushed them away from turboprops by subjecting them to the=20 same safety regulations as those of a wide-body jet. Mesa CEO Jonathan=20 Ornstein, who lobbied against the regulations at the time, says Mesa has=20 shed almost 80 turboprops because of the higher costs. "We had 13 airplanes= =20 in our Albuquerque operation. Now, we have five. There's no more service to= =20 Taos. Las Cruces? No more service. We're exiting Gallup, N.M.," says=20 Ornstein. "The costs went up, fares went up, and people started driving.=20 But what can we do?" 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