MacArthur said to be on JetBlue short list

Long Island MacArthur Airport is on a short list of three as JetBlue Airways considers a new destination in the Northeast, officials said.

As part of the sales pitch, airport and Islip Town officials Monday will join Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) to announce the breakthrough at the Ronkonkoma airport, which operates about one-third its daily flight capacity.

Schumer, who has a history of working with JetBlue, called the carrier's chief executive, Dave Barger, Friday to lobby on behalf of MacArthur.

"I said I'd be willing to do whatever it took with federal and state authorities to bring them here," the senator told Newsday in an interview. "Bottom line: I think we have a decent shot, a real shot."

Islip Town Supervisor Phil Nolan said the town-owned airport was a natural extension of JetBlue's New York regional strategy. The carrier currently flies out of Kennedy Airport, LaGuardia, Newark, White Plains, Stewart in Newburgh and Rochester, Syracuse and Buffalo upstate.

Service at MacArthur would enable it to blanket the entire New York region.

The two other airports in contention have not been disclosed, but sources said they are both out-of-state regional airfields.

"It's our ready-made Long Island market, the superb facility we have at MacArthur and the fact that congestion means their growth plans can't be accommodated in NYC, which makes us a no-brainer," said Nolan.

JetBlue will not tip its hand, but a spokeswoman acknowledged it plans an aggressive market expansion "throughout the Americas," and that MacArthur is a contender.

Schumer said the time is right to make "a full-court press" to woo the carrier, with its expansion in the Northeast set for 2013.

He noted the airline would realize greater efficiencies in takeoff and departure timing if it chose MacArthur because the less-congested Long Island airspace would cut delays and wasted fuel.

In the late 1990s, Schumer helped JetBlue establish itself with 75 slots at Kennedy in exchange for an agreement that the carrier fly to upstate airports.

In a letter to Barger, Schumer wrote that expanding to Long Island -- a region whose population is larger than those of 19 states -- the company has "an unparalleled opportunity" to grow its business in a large, middle-class region largely underserved by major carriers.

The airport's own study of Long Islanders' air service demand shows MacArthur loses about 3 million of its 4 million potential travelers to New York airports because of insufficient destinations from Islip.

Another argument in the Islip airport's favor: JetBlue already advertises heavily throughout New York, so the addition of MacArthur would not require any new media buy for marketing.

One of JetBlue's targeted growth areas is the Caribbean, an area MacArthur has been trying to secure for years. Officials are also actively wooing more destinations out of the airport's mainstay carrier, Southwest, as well as several international airlines."We're always looking for airlines that can give our residents new destinations so we are thankful for the senator's support in our ongoing efforts to grow MacArthur," said Nolan.