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OST-2004-18443 - Essential Air Service - Civic Comments on Air Carrier Selections
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Essential Air Service Communities
June 25, 2004 Re: Letter Seeking Civic Comments on Air Carrier Selections In making fiscal year 2004 appropriations, the House Committee on Appropriations accompanied the bill with an Appropriations Report (House Report 108-243) expressing concern over the rising costs of the EAS program. In an effort to improve how communities’ air service needs can be met, the Committee directs the Secretary of Transportation to seek views from each community receiving subsidized EAS regarding "how federal, state, and local efforts could cooperate to improve how essential transportation needs can be met, including flexible options of how funds might best be obtained and applied to meet those needs." Subsequently, Congress has asked that we compile this information and submit it in a report, along with the Secretary’s recommendations. By: Dennis DeVany
June 29, 2004 Re: Letter Seeking Civic Comments on Air Carrier Selections - Alaskan Carriers In making fiscal year 2004 appropriations, the House Committee on Appropriations accompanied the bill with an Appropriations Report (House Report 108-243) expressing concern over the rising costs of the EAS program. In an effort to improve how communities’ air service needs can be met, the Committee directs the Secretary of Transportation to seek views from each community receiving subsidized EAS regarding "how federal, state, and local efforts could cooperate to improve how essential transportation needs can be met, including flexible options of how funds might best be obtained and applied to meet those needs." Subsequently, Congress has asked that we compile this information and submit it in a report, along with the Secretary’s recommendations. To better ensure the involvement of the Alaskan communities participating in the EAS program, we would ask you to distribute this letter to those communities listed in the attachment. By: Dennis DeVany
June 29, 2004 Re: Letter from the City of Muscle Shoals By: David Bradford
June 30, 2004 Re: Letter from the Forrest Wright By: Forrest Wright
July 16, 2004 Re: Letter form The City of Dickinson | Word The Dickinson/Theodore Roosevelt Regional Airport has been serviced by Great Lakes Airlines since it reestablished commercial service over a decade ago. We are now serviced by three incoming and outgoing flights per day. This airport is located in Southwestern North Dakota 100 miles from the nearest commercial air service airport (the Bismarck Airport). Great Lakes Airlines provides daily service to people throughout the Southwest Region of North Dakota and portions of Montana and South Dakota. It would be nearly impossible for the Dickinson/Theodore Roosevelt Regional Airport to maintain commercial service without the EAS subsidy. We believe it is also important to keep in mind that without air service in Dickinson, there are persons in the region, who would be more than 200 miles from the nearest commercial service airport. If Dickinson lost EAS and thereby commercial service, the distances to commercial air service would essentially eliminate true commercial service to rural residents in this region. For this reason, the Dickinson/Theodore Roosevelt Regional Airport truly provides essential air service throughout our region. We ask the federal government to strongly consider the negative outcomes of eliminating EAS or even returning to the requirements for local subsidies of EAS. The city of Dickinson used to struggle each year to fund maintenance activities at Dickinson/Theodore Roosevelt Regional Airport. Therefore we are also concerned that the current review of this program may result in a return to local cost shares. We are strongly opposed to this. By: Greg Sund
July 14, 2004 Re: Comments of the City of Huron, SD We will never be able to improve our boardings levels with "sub-standard" service. One cannot reasonably expect our passengers to ride Model T's and pay more for it while bigger communities offer limousines and pay less for it. To address the question of how funds may be obtained and applied to meet the current needs seems to bypass the first issue of first how do we make the service work. Granted, there are communities that will never succeed in becoming self sufficient regardless of the level of subsidy applied. But elimination from the program based on failure to improve boardings numbers or per passenger subsidy alone without looking at the historical background and related issues such as past service reliability and quality of the previous carrier is unfair and in many cases unwarranted. Certain communities because of location or other factors may need subsidy just to continue because the population does not exist to ever make it profitable to serve them. They should not be denied purely on a per passenger subsidy basis. On the other hand, communities such as ours that have repeatedly shown a positive response to improved service should be given the opportunity to expand upon that history to the best of its ability and not be stuck in a pattern of continuing substandard service. Give the communities a reasonable expectation of success and the funding question can be realistically addressed. Give the program a chance to eliminate through success those communities that have the ability and then address the funding question to cover the significantly fewer number of communities that remain. When transportation programs are considered, a program like EAS is small compared to the billions spent in some communities for mass transit programs. To spend a hundred plus million dollars annually to provide 140 cities with access to the national air transportation system seems small when you consider that the federal share of the "Big Dig" in Boston alone would run the EAS program for over 75 years at current funding levels. The amount of money involved should not be the issue. The issue should be how to make the best use of the dollars that are available and insure the future of the program. If it is necessary that the communities become a part of the funding equation then at least give them something worth funding. By: Mary Pearson
July 21, 2004 Re: Letter from Jackson-Madison County Airport Authority (TN) McKellar‑Sipes Regional Airport is located 80 miles from Memphis and 120 miles from Nashville and is owned jointly by Madison County and the City of Jackson. We became an EAS subsidized city in March, 2001 when Northwest AirLink discontinued air service to Memphis and Corporate Airlines d/b/a TWExpress initiated three daily flights to St. Louis. Two of these flights qualified for EAS assistance. American Airlines purchased TWA and in December, 2001 the carrier began to operate as AmericanConnection. Prior to the terrorist events of September 11, 2001, our boardings were steadily increasing and the airline was considering a fourth daily flight. However, since the takeover of TWA by American Airlines, we have experienced large fare increases, decreased connections at the hub and the reduction of flights to two daily. This has resulted in a substantial decrease in local boardings. You requested our view on how various governments could cooperate to improve essential transportation needs. We propose that the affected community become more involved in the airline negotiation and selection process. This may include more than one community working together. Prior to becoming an EAS city, we shared a larger airplane and three daily flights with another city. Both cities now have become EAS cities with only two daily flights each. Had both communities been able to use EAS funds to contract jointly with the airline, we possibly could have been able to retain the three daily flights for both cities. By: Rodney Hendrix
July 15, 2004 Re: Gila Regional Medical Center Comments / EAS at Grant County, NM Any reduction in the EAS program would result in the current carrier ‑ Mesa Air Lines ‑discontinuing its service to Grant County. The loss of service would negatively impact our local economy in many ways. Since the area has seen a significant shrinking of its economy as a result of the closure of the mines, it is unlikely that local governments could afford any additional strain upon their reduced tax revenues as a means to replace the EAS subsidies. By: John Rossfeld
July 26, 2004 Re: Comments of The City of Page, AZ The City of Page, Arizona (PGA), is some 280 miles from either Phoenix, Arizona, or Las Vegas, Nevada, or 5 hours driving time by automobile to either large hub airport. This is too much travel time for the business traveler, and affects leisure travel as well. Page sits in the center of the "Grand Circle" of National Parks: Lake Powell National Recreation Area, Rainbow Bridge, Bryce Canyon, Zion, Grand Canyon, etc.; thus attracting some four (4) million visitors each year. As such, we have 5-6 air tour operators using PGA. To this end, we are working with the Arizona Department of Transportation and their Small Community Air Service Development Pilot Program (SCASDPP) to solicit an air carrier(s) for four (4) EAS rural AZ communities (Page, Show Low, Kingman, Prescott), plus Sierra Vista with the goal to increase enplanements and thereby reduce demands on EAS funds. In support of travel needs and tourism, Kingman, Prescott and Page are considering the addition of Las Vegas as well as our current Phoenix hub; and Page will be working with the selected air carrier to tie into our air tour business. We intend to use funds from the SCASDPP for incentives to increase enplanements; and new funds from AZ Dept. of Transportation and each of the five cities for a strong marketing program. Within a two year period, we hope to increase enplanements two to three fold; thus reducing demand on EAS funds. In the meantime, we need full funding of the EAS program to realize our goals. By: J. Dean Slavens
July 8, 2004 Re: The City of Kingman Letter in Support of EAS at Kingman, AZ Located in Northwestern Arizona, Kingman is a rural community. We are a bit of an anomaly in that we are situated between two hub airports, Phoenix, Sky Harbor and Las Vegas, McCarren, with service currently provided by America West Express (Air Midwest/Mesa) to Phoenix, our capital city and government center. It appears it is our proximity to Las Vegas that has our community being questioned within the proposed program reductions. The City of Kingman is a member of a consortium of Arizona EAS airport communities working with the Arizona Department of Transportation Aeronautics Division and U.S. Department of Transportation to provide marketing assistance or incentives to the EAS carriers to help increase enpianements in each of the participating communities. The goal is to generate new interest in air travel along with recapturing leakage to the hub airports. The incentives being considered by the consortium will be based on new enplanements and performance standards and not for the air carrier's maintenance of existing service practices. Because the consortium is in its infancy, it is not anticipated that the success can be measured until two full years have transpired. By: Monica Gates
July 12, 2004 Re: The City of Herrin Letter in Support of EAS at Herrin, IL Williamson County Regional Airport accommodates the only scheduled commercial airline service for the entire region of Southern Illinois. Corporate Airlines d/b/a American Connection provides daily flights to and from St. Louis, with annual enpianements of approximately 12,000. Traffic potential in our region is far greater than that presently realized, but as with the airline industry nationwide, airline travel from the airport has seen limited growth in recent years. Congress created the EAS program in an effort to insure that certain small communities would continue to receive commercial air service after it deregulated the airline industry. The program has been very successful, although in recent years it has suffered from irregular funding. In addition, the present consideration of requiring local communities to fund a 10%‑25% local share of the subsidy would seriously jeopardize the program's capabilities and original intent. Within the smaller communities that comprise the air service market in Southern Illinois, the resources do not exist to fund up to $200,000 on an annual basis for continued EAS funding. The Williamson County Region Airport is not financially capable of backing such a local investment in light of its ongoing operation and maintenance cost. By: Victor Ritter
July 14, 2004 Re: The Office of The Grant County Commissioners Letter in Support of EAS in Grant County, NM I anticipate that any reduction in the EAS program would result in the current carrier Mesa Air Lines ‑ discontinuing its service to Grant County. The loss of service would negatively impact our local economy in many ways. Two years ago the local mines closed which resulted in thousands of layoffs. Since the area has seen a significant shrinking of its economy as a result of the closure of the mines, it is unlikely that local governments could afford any additional strain upon their reduced tax revenues as a means to replace the EAS subsidies. By: Henry Torres
July 30, 2004 Re: The City of Pierre Letter in Support of EAS at Pierre, SD The City feels one of the keys to the long-term success of our airport is to become self-sufficient. In an effort to become subsidy free we have applied for and received a Small Community Air Service Grant. We have hired a consultant to assist us in our endeavor. Our efforts include researching our market, developing a plan of action, development of a community support plan, development of an advertising plan, and meeting with the airlines. It is our belief that development of a program in cooperation with the community and the airlines is key to the success of our program. By: Dennis Eisnach
July 16, 2004 Re: Representative Dan Surra Letter in Support of EAS at Clearfield-Jefferson Airport, WV It is my understanding that Mesa Air Group has applied for Essential Air Service (EAS) with the federal government. Without the Clearfield-Jefferson County Airport this rural area would be very isolated when it comes to air service and air transportation service. Essential Air Status would help ensure that the air transportation needs for the citizens and businesses of the area are maintained. By: Dan Surra
August 12, 2004 Proposal to Rebuild Ridership at Ponca City Municipal Airport | Word The community through the Ponca City Development Authority will fund a professional consultant in an amount not to exceed $15,000 for the purpose of preselling tickets on Mesa flights. The goal of this campaign will be to "pre‑sell" 1,000 tickets on Mesa Airlines. By: David Myers
July 8, 2004 Re: Corporate Airlines Letter in Support of EAS at Cape Girardeau, MO The markets that Corporate Airlines serves to the St. Louis hub generally have fairly strong passenger traffic for communities of their size. Unfortunately, with the cost of air service today it is unlikely that we or any company can operate scheduled air service to these communities profitably. Without this essential air service it is very likely that economic development in the communities would suffer. Today air service is the vehicle of business transportation. Lack of access to the nation's air transportation system would have a similar impact as that experienced by communities bypassed by the railroads or interstate highway system in previous decades. By: Douglas Caldwell
July 26, 2004 Re: The City of Cape Girardeau Letter in Support of EAS at Cape Girardeau, MO Any business today depends highly on good, reliable air transportation. Without some level of scheduled air passenger service, the City of Cape Girardeau's industrial recruitment capabilities would most certainly experience difficulties, and our overall economic development would suffer. The Essential Air Service program assists our community by ensuring that we maintain air service as a vital element for healthy economic growth. By: Jay Knudtson
July 22, 2004 Re: The City of North Platte Letter in Support of EAS at North Platte, NE The‑North Platte's airport has the airside and landside infrastructure to function as a regional airport. Specifically, our airport terminal building is large enough to accommodate the bigger aircraft and larger number of passengers associated with a regional EAS program. By: James Whitaker
August 9, 2004 Re: Comments of Show Low Regional Airport, Show Low, Arizona Passenger enplanements at Show Low have fluctuated from a low of 1,300 in 1997 to an all‑time high of 3,746 in 1999. In 2002 Arizona Express enplaned 1,283 passengers in Show Low followed by a 66% increase in 2003 to 1,937 enplaned passengers. Total enplaned and deplaned passengers on Arizona Express in Show Low for the year ending December 31, 2003 were 3,981. In a recently completed Economic Impact Study conducted by the Arizona Department of Transportation's Aeronautics Division the Economic Impact of the Show Low Regional Airport for 2002 was estimated to be in excess of $9.7 million. This Impact figure represents a significant number for a city with a full‑time population of approximately 8,800 citizens and an economy largely based on tourism and recreation. The Essential Air Service program has been instrumental in the transport of an estimated 57,000 passengers to and from Show Low in the past 10 years. Based on the increasing passenger numbers noted in the last few years, this number will only grow in the next 10 years. The amount of economic benefits realized by this city, and our neighboring communities, is unimaginable. If each of these passengers spent only $100 in Show Low on lodging, meals, transportation, shopping, etc., the community would realize almost $5,700,000 in increased revenue and sales. For a small community such as ours, this type of additional revenue is substantial. By: Rick Fernau
July 23, 2004 Re: The City of Ogdensburg Letter in Support of the Continuation of Service at Ogdensburg, NY Ogdensburg is a small, rural community in upstate New York on the U.S.‑ Canada Border. We are the only City in St. Lawrence County ‑ one of the largest counties in land area east of the Mississippi River. The nearest airport with regular passenger service is a one‑hour trip north to Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, and the nearest US Airport is Hancock Airport in Syracuse, New York. The Syracuse trek is 2 hours south of Ogdensburg through one of the most treacherous weather conditions in New York Slate, through a zone known as the snow belt, which has countless sudden and severe lake affect snow storms arising from Lake Ontario.
By: William Nelson, Mayor
September 2, 2004 Re: North Maine Regional Airport Letter in Support of Travel Banks Overall the EAS program provides an adequate safety net for communities which are faced with the possibility of loosing air service. However, it does not provide adequate mechanisms for communities to grow their enplanements and thereby reducing the need for EAS funding. Admittedly, there are some EAS communities, which based on area population and/or relatively short distances to alternative airports, can never be profitable unless the airline industry changes substantially. I like to think that Presque Isle is not one of those communities. We are one of the larger EAS communities in the number of enplanements. In addition, our air service market area is located an average of 3 hours away from the next largest alternative airport. I propose that the US DOT set up another program that operates similar to a local travel bank. Travel banks have been setup at airports across the country where area businesses group together to generate a revenue guarantee. These travel banks have been used with some success in larger communities and some smaller communities. However, what I am proposing is a program integrated into the EAS program with the goal of growing marginal EAS communities. The program would act as the source of funding for revenue guarantees to launch air service improvements such as larger aircraft. By introducing sustained air service improvements into these small marginal airports, the downward spiral could be broken. In the long run it will save the EAS program money as smaller airports increase market share and become more economically viable. This program would be competitive as well but would be limited to EAS airports only. It would require communities to develop a proposal containing justification for why EAS should fund a higher level of service. It would need to be backed by sound market research. Some sort of local or airline match would be required. This would reduce the number of communities to those that truly had a chance and a desire to reach sustainability. Under such a program, Presque Isle could try such air service upgrades as cabin class service, regional jet service, and/or increase flight frequency. By: Scott Wardwell
September 10, 2004 Re: Response of The City of Dodge City, KS In summary, while the City of Dodge City respects and appreciates the committee's concerns and its interest in soliciting suggestions for improvement of service at a reasonable and justifiable expense to the federal government, we are fearful such concerns and interest are but another effort to impose upon EAS communities a responsibility which in reality should be addressed in a positive fashion by Congress itself. We are confident that EAS communities are sincerely interested in cost effective improvements in order to enhance the benefits of the program, and would be willing to work with program administrators in an effort the cooperatively develop viable service options. However, the opportunity to do so depends to a significant extent on the willingness of Congress to provide a foundation of support for the program and its willingness to grant the flexibility necessary to Stimulate innovative concepts. By: Dodge City
September 13, 2004 Re: Comments of Montana Aeronautics Division and Governor’s Essential Air Service Task Force | Word If communities have to pay to comply with certain Part 139 requirements, these costs must be passed on to the air carrier. The air carrier will pass costs on to the DOT and the cost per passenger for EAS will increase and could eliminate service to some communities. This unfunded mandate cannot be absorbed by the communities. In Montana passengers pay a security fee to travel between an EAS community and the hub of Billings but these passengers do not receive any benefit for the security fee. By: Debbie Alke and John Rabenberg
November 17, 2004 The City of Hays, being one of the communities that receives subsidized EAS, has the following views on how federal, state, and local efforts could cooperate to improve how essential transportation needs can be met, including flexible options of how funds might best be obtained and applied to meet those needs. The Essential Air Service Program may want to review the eligibility criteria for EAS communities. Communities that are within an hour drive of a small, medium, or large hub airport may not require essential air service. The statement that air service to small communities has risen drastically over the past few years reflects the increased cost of fuel and the decreased boardings after the events of 9-11. The airport board at their July meeting suggested the Department of Transportation not require aircraft to land at a station that has no passengers and that airlines that flew EAS routes be given a tax break when purchasing fuel. I have also enclosed a copy of the Statement of Lavern D. Squier, Executive Director, Ellis County Coalition for Economic Development, Hearing before the Subcommittee on Aviation Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure United States House of Representatives on March 12, 2003 stating the importance of sustaining Essential Air Service for rural communities. By: Terry Urban
November 24, 2004 Re: Comments of Owensboro-Daviess County Regional Airport Board The airline industry is facing some of its biggest challenges in its entire history. Rising fuel costs, the emergence of low cost carriers and regional jets, terrorism and security costs coupled with the downturn in the economy has had a tremendous impact on commercial passenger service. All of these factors have had a detrimental effect on small rural markets such as Owensboro. If not for the EAS subsidies, we would have lost airline service years ago. Our future is still uncertain with the changes taking place in American Airline's operations in St. Louis. Thankfully; Congress recognized the challenges we're facing and enacted The Small Community Air Service Development Pilot Program (SCASDPP) which gives us the flexibility to use federal funds in the best possible way to enhance air service to our community. By: Tim Bradshaw
January 10, 2005 The comments generally mirror what we have heard anecdotally for more than 20 years: local service is vital, but if the EAS (carrier provided reliable service with more frequencies, larger aircraft and at lower fares, more passengers would use the local service rather than drive to a larger airport for a much broader array of service and fare options. We continue to believe that the program is in need of reform, without which the required funding will continue to spiral upward. We have had many years of experience with the Essential Air Service Program and more recently with the Small Community Air Service Development Pilot Program (Pilot Program) that have been very instructive. It is clear that the way we help small communities has not kept pace with their needs, the changes in the airline industry, or the way that air service has evolved in this country. The tremendous growth of low-fare air service, the changes in the types of aircraft used in regional services, and the expanded operational relationships between small and larger carriers, such as code sharing, have greatly impacted the service provided. As a result, in many cases, the service now provided under the EAS program is often not responsive to the communities’ needs and is frequently not used or supported, and taxpayer dollars are not used in the most effective or efficient manner. Since 9/11, we have received more than 60 notices by carriers to terminate the last service at a community, most of them triggering first-time EAS subsidy. By necessity we must make changes to the government’s role in small community transportation or the price tag will spiral out of control. Such changes are contained in the President’s fiscal year 2005 budget proposal. These reforms are directed at responding to the desire of small communities to participate in a more direct anti substantive way in their air service issues, and to be a true “partner,” rather than observer, in the solutions to their transportation needs. By: DOT Office of Aviation Analysis
May 4, 2007 Comments of Regional Aviation Partners It is our understanding that your department is considering hosting a symposium where small community air service stakeholders will be invited to participate in and identify regulatory barriers affecting commercial air service to small communities and to further discuss ideas for improving rural air service. Mr. Reynolds, we believe a symposium presents an excellent opportunity to exchange and develop reform ideas which have a chance of having a real and positive impact on small community air service. RAP would like to extend an offer to “host” or “co-host” such a forum. RAP is the leading advocacy group in the nation exclusively dedicated to preserving Essential Air Service in rural and small communities. We look forward to working with you and your office as the Fiscal Year 2008 FAA Reauthorization process progresses and hope you will accept our offer to jointly host a small community air service symposium. By: RAP, Maurice Parker |
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