It’s a New Year’s Resolution that takes extra meaning at a time when the airport’s rebound from the COVID-19 pandemic has lagged behind its chief competitors in Columbus and Cincinnati.
Dayton’s passenger traffic in 2022 came in about 30% short of pre-pandemic, 2019 levels, Turner said.
Compare that, for instance, to Columbus’ John Glenn International Airport, which saw its total passengers trailing 2019 levels by a far smaller 13.5% as of October, according to airline-reported data.
Why the discrepancy?
It comes down to the airlines, the airfare, and the destinations offered in Columbus — and in Cincinnati — Turner explained.
As air travel has rebounded from the pandemic, demand for business travel has recovered at a slower pace than demand for leisure travel, according to a report this month from the airline trade group Airlines for America.
That means, compared to three years ago, when you go to the airport, a higher percentage of your fellow passengers are flying for the purpose of family vacations and weekend getaways.
“That’s where most of the traffic is now,” Turner explained.
And that’s where the problem comes in.
“Prior to the pandemic, Dayton was more of a business travel-type airport,” he said.
As of October, about 43% of Columbus’ passengers were flying aboard ‘low-cost’ and ‘ultra-low-cost’ airlines Southwest, Frontier, Breeze and Spirit. Those four airlines have two key things in common: All focus heavily on popular vacation destinations, and none serve Dayton; Southwest departed the Miami Valley for good in 2017.
For its part, Dayton has one ultra low-cost carrier — Allegiant — flying to popular Florida destinations, and will begin offering service aboard a second such airline this month: Avelo Airlines will begin nonstop flights this week from Dayton to Orlando, home of Walt Disney World and Universal Studios.
Turner sees this addition as just the beginning as he charts the airport’s course for 2023.
“A ‘win’ would be for … Avelo to grow, to add destinations such as, possibly, Tampa, Fort Myers, maybe to the West Coast, to Vegas,” he said, while turning his attention to another challenge on his mind for the year ahead.
“For the other airlines to increase services as well,” Turner said.
That comment is a reference to the airport’s core airlines that have not restored some routes dropped in recent years. Turner is hoping to see United Airlines, for instance, restore its service to Denver, and hopes Delta Air Lines will resume flights from Dayton to Minneapolis.
It’s a steep task at a time when, nationwide, smaller airports have seen airlines cut routes amid staffing — including pilot — shortages.
To the north, Toledo Express Airport now only has service aboard Allegiant to a small handful of destinations after American Airlines’ final flight left the gate late last year; a route-cutting trend expected to persist, and potentially worsen, in 2023, the Regional Airlines Association told the Dayton Daily News.
Ultimately, decisions on airline routes are up to the airlines — not local officials, though.
That leaves Turner and his fellow leaders in Dayton to control what they can: Reminding passengers about recent renovation projects aimed at improving the passenger experience, working with food vendors to ensure restaurants and stores remain open as often as possible, and pushing the ease of parking and flying out of Dayton, even in cases where an airline might offer a flight at a lower cost out of Columbus or Cincinnati.
“We’re just trying to be an easy, friendly, hometown airport that offers convenient services,” Turner said, sharing cautious optimism about the year ahead, with perhaps his strongest selling point for passengers in tow: “You get to the end of your destination and you’re home already,” he said of Dayton’s airport. “You don’t have to drive two hours to get back home.”
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