American Airlines adds more Memphis flights
More flights with American Airlines are coming for the growing number of passengers flying out of Memphis International Airport.
On Jan. 7, the airline will begin an additional route between Memphis International and Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in Washington, D.C. The flight will run four times daily on weekdays, plus one Saturday flight and two Sunday flights.
American Airlines brought a second Miami frequency into the fold in early October, which runs five days a week and opens new one-stop connections in the Caribbean, Central America and South America, the airport said in a recent news release.
Pace Cooper, chairman of the Memphis-Shelby County Airport Authority board of commissioners, said the new flights show airlines are catching up with a bump in flight demand to and from Memphis.
Enplanements, or occupied seats on flights, for the airport’s 2019 fiscal year first quarter (July through September) totaled 559,774. That’s a 5.1 percent increase from the same period in 2018 at 532,321, per the airport’s most recent treasurer’s report, and beat the airport’s own estimates for the quarter.
“This is pretty significant growth,” Forrest Artz, vice president of finance and administration at the airport, said during the Memphis-Shelby County Airport Authority’s regular board of commissioners meeting last week.
The additional flights don’t change the entire outlook of the airport in one fell swoop, Cooper said. But they are small victories that could lead to benefits like an eventual upgrade in the airport’s classification from a small hub to a medium hub, he said. The Federal Aviation Administration’s hub classifications are determined by annual passenger boardings.
More seats to fill
Airport representatives also have touted other statistics noted in the treasurer’s report. Airport load factor stayed roughly the same in September 2018 (74 percent) compared with September 2017 (75 percent), even with more than 500 additional seats available daily.
Besides more flights, airlines also are using larger aircraft at Memphis International Airport, contributing to the higher total of seats to fill, airport spokesman Glen Thomas said.
“Our load factors are basically flat,” Artz said. “What that means is our enplanement numbers have grown in order to keep that load factor flat.”
Enplanements were already rising at the airport before its 2018 first quarter began, jumping 4 percent to 2.1 million total in 2017, per FAA data.
Passenger numbers still aren’t where they were more than a decade ago.
The airport had 5.5 million enplanements in 2007, per FAA flight data. That was the year before Delta Air Lines’ acquisition of Northwest and subsequent reduction of flights out of Memphis, before it eventually closed the hub.
Dehubbing means less “passing through” traffic, but Cooper said growth in origin and destination traffic, plus the ongoing modernization of the B Concourse, are good signs for the airport’s future.
The FAA projects enplanements at small hub airports to increase 2.12 percent annually, compared with 2.14 percent for medium hub airports.
Memphis International Airport’s peak day flight total in September had 82 scheduled flights, up from 78 in September 2017.
New flights out West
For those looking to fly out West, Southwest Airlines launched its nonstop service between Memphis and Denver International Airport on Oct. 3.
“The route will make it easier and faster for Memphis travelers to reach the Rocky Mountains and more destinations within the Southwest network,” Ana Schwager, Southwest Airlines’ community affairs and grassroots regional leader, said in a statement.
The airport’s strategic overview, published in 2017, said the airport plans to add more nonstop West Coast destinations by the end of 2018.
Cooper said airport officials are “really shaking the trees” on that front and, along with additional frequencies, adding nonstops to San Francisco and a Western connector like Salt Lake City are priorities.