Southwest to ditch LI-Chicago flights

Southwest Airlines will cease direct service between Chicago and Islip in June, a blow to Long Island MacArthur Airport's drive for more destinations.

Citing low passenger loads, Southwest will eliminate nonstop daily flights to Midway Airport starting June 2, forcing fliers to other airports for direct flights to Chicago. In the past year, the carrier has flown three and four flights daily from MacArthur, depending on the season.

Southwest will remain MacArthur's dominant carrier -- it has flown from the airport since 1999 -- but the move will pare its daily flight total to 20, down from a high of 34 in 2007.

Airline spokeswoman Whitney Eichinger said the MacArthur-Midway route "showed sustained low load factors" -- she declined to detail numbers -- and, in the tough economic environment, "Southwest is forced to reallocate aircraft to routes where our customers are expressing higher demand."

U.S. Department of Transportation statistics show that in the year ending in June, MacArthur-Midway flights averaged 74.7 percent passenger loading, compared with Southwest's nationwide average of 80.1 percent. The load factor for Southwest's LaGuardia-Midway route was 87.2 percent for the year ended Aug. 31.

Competition from LaGuardia is a factor in Southwest's decision, several analysts said, and Southwest has inherited an additional eight departure and arrival slots at LaGuardia as a result of its recent acquisition of AirTran.

The latest analysis by the airport shows MacArthur continues to leak passengers from eastern Nassau and Suffolk to other metropolitan New York airports. MacArthur is capturing 49 percent of the passengers that fly to Chicago from that catchment area, but 51 percent who fly to O'Hare or Midway use alternative airports, officials said.

Fares do not appear to have been much of a factor either way: The average one-way fare from MacArthur to Midway in 2010 was $106; across all carriers from LaGuardia, the average fare the same year was $118.

Airport Commissioner Teresa Rizzuto said Southwest's decision is disappointing. "Southwest has made a decision that the number of passengers in and out of MacArthur are not sustainable to keep their service, which just serves to emphasize our point that to maintain and grow destinations at MacArthur, we need the traveling public of Long Island to fly out of here whenever possible. That is how we'll improve air service and economic activity for Long Island as well."

Analyst Mike Boyd of Colorado-based Boyd Group International, said Southwest's decision came down to business strategy. "It has nothing to do with the eastern Long Island market, or MacArthur Airport or the way the Town of Islip runs the airport," he said.

"A load factor of 75 percent is about average for Islip -- it's pretty good. Southwest is taking a decision to move its planes to where they can get the most revenue for their system, where they can make more money per seat.

"They know they are still the dominant carrier, so if they lessen up at MacArthur, they'll still be doing OK."