Bradley fights to stay in top flight during COVID
Airport braces for lengthy recovery in the aviation industry
“I think our recovery is going to be very much tied to vaccine distribution.” Kevin Dillon, executive director of the Connecticut Airport Authority
After nearly a year of unprecedented disruption, Connecticut’s flagship airport has made significant changes in anticipation that the coronavirus crisis will continue to tamp down air travel in 2021.
As it contends with slashed levels of airline service, Bradley International Airport has cut costs in a number of areas in response to its declining revenues. The financial strain will not dissipate in 2021, but airport officials are hopeful that the adjustments will safeguard the Windsor Locks hub’s finances and persuade airlines to make longterm commitments.
“All of the airlines have indicated that they plan to emerge from the pandemic much smaller carriers,” Kevin Dillon, executive director of the Connecticut Airport Authority,
which owns and operates Bradley, said in an interview. “The competition that was always there prepandemic is only going to get more intense to convince an airline to put their limited assets into your airport. We’re focused on positioning ourselves appropriately so airlines say, ‘Let’s put the aircraft in Bradley.’”
Fewer passengers — and fewer flights
Since the start of the pandemic, airports and airlines have been grappling with steep decreases in demand.
A total of about 2.1 million travelers passed through Bradley in the first 10 months of 2020, down 63 percent from the same period in 2019.
Activity picked up during the holidays, but by a wide margin the numbers still trailed the previous year’s turnout. From Dec. 18 to Jan. 3, about 64,000 passengers were screened at Bradley, down 63 percent from a year ago.
The dwindling passenger counts have inevitably led to greatly reduced airline service. At times in the past 10 months, Bradley’s daily flight volume has plunged more than 50 percent from levels before the pandemic, according to CAA officials.
Reflecting the severe restrictions on international travel, Aer Lingus and Air Canada have suspended their service at Bradley. Domestic carriers American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Frontier Airlines, JetBlue, Spirit Airlines, Southwest Airlines and United Airlines are still operating there.
CAA officials expect Aer Lingus and Air Canada to resume service when the pandemic abates.
“All of them are scaling operations based on the level of demand,” Dillon said. “When your demand is off by 75 percent, that leads to a substantial reduction in activity on the part of the airlines.”
Bradley had added a number of routes in the past few years, including the 2016 launch of Aer Lingus service with direct flights to and from Dublin.
New York’s Westchester County Airport is another regional aviation hub that has made major changes in the past year. Delta and United have suspended their service there, but they might resume within the next couple of months, according to airport officials. American and JetBlue are still operating there.
In October, the airport recorded an average of 57 weekly departures, compared with about 270 before the pandemic.
Transportation Security Administration officials said last week that they expect daily passenger traffic to rise steadily and “follow seasonal patterns.” But they anticipate that volumes will remain well below prepandemic levels through most of 2021, an outlook shared by Dillon.
“I don’t see any meaningful recovery starting until the end of 2021,” he said. “I think our recovery is going to be very much tied to vaccine distribution.”
Tightening the belt
Bradley is facing financial pressure amid the drop-off in flight activity. In the quarter from April 1, 2020, to June 30, 2020, revenues fell about $10 million short of projections.
In response, the airport has reined in costs with an initial 10 percent cut in operating expenses and then an additional 10 percent cut, a hiring freeze, as well as deferred salary increases for non-union staff.
The airport has not made layoffs since the start of the coronavirus crisis. The CAA employs about 150, the vast majority of whom are based at Bradley.
“One of the reasons we’re making the adjustments we’re making is to avoid layoffs,” Dillon said. “At the start of this pandemic, I made a commitment to folks that we would work hard to protect their health by putting different safety measures in place at the airport. Second to that, we would work to protect their jobs.”
Bradley covers its expenses with revenues that include airlines’ landing fees, passenger-parking fees and contributions from rental-car companies and terminal concessions. It does not receive any money from the state’s general fund.
“We’re struggling with substantial budget deficits. And, at the same time, we’re trying to make sure we keep the cost to the airlines as reasonable as possible,” Dillon said. “That’s going to be the continuing challenge, through 2021, until we get to that point of meaningful recovery.”
Despite deferring about $ 22 million of capital improvements, the airport is moving ahead with the construction of an approximately $ 210 million transportation center. The project includes about 850 parking spaces, a consolidated rental-car facility and a dedicated area for taxis, limousines, buses and a potential rail connection. The work is scheduled to be completed in 2022.
“It was so far advanced at the start of the pandemic that we would have been in a worse position by trying to curtail the work at that point,” Dillon said.
Business leaders in the state are heartened by the airport’s long-term planning.
“They were heading in the right direction,” said Chris DiPentima, CEO and president of the Connecticut Business & Industry Association. “If they can keep their foot somewhat on the gas, they’re going to come out stronger and better. And I think the Connecticut economy will come out stronger and better.”