Ben Mutzabaugh, who writes Today In The Sky for USA Today, wrote an interesting article about Philadelphia local politicians attempting to persuade carriers to shift flights from Philadelphia International Airport (PHL) to Atlantic City International Airport (ACY) to ease delays at PHL. Two representatives, Joe Sestak of PA and Rob Andrews of NJ, Democrats, said moving 50,000 flights per year to Atlantic City International Airport could possibly cut delays at Philadelphia from an average of 23 minutes down to nine. Although there may be a lot to gain from this, there is a lot to lose.
“Shifting” these flights from Philadelphia to Atlantic City causes hassle; but how much? Google Maps tells us that it’s a 1 hour and nine minute drive from Philadelphia International to Atlantic City. Although official information is not available to tell us, we can make a fair guesstimate that over 50% of Philadelphia International Airport users are on the Pennsylvania side of things. If you’re south of the Maryland-Pennsylvania border, you’ll probably go to Baltimore-Washington (BWI). If you’re in northern Jersey, you’ll probably go to Newark or one of the other NYC airports. The shift to Atlantic City may decrease delays at Philadelphia International Airport, but it just adds more time to travelers’ commutes to the airport.
Less capacity and fewer schedule-fitting flights – this is already happening because of the recession. Should there really be yet another cut to schedules and capacity? It’s not the best for Philadelphians. How many flights does the airport fly each year currently? Well, in 2007 they saw about 500,000 flight operations; the politicians are proposing a ten percent cut in flights at the growing airport.
More money spent – shifting the flights to Atlantic City would cost about $1 million. No expansion is needed, except to security at Atlantic City. Remember, The FAA has had plans for an $840 million runway expansion at Philadelphia for quite some time now, and I think that may help quite a lot – larger aircraft can depart more runways.
I see the problems that the politicians talk about; there is no better way to put it, but there just isn’t any more room for growth at Philadelphia International. The new runway extension pretty much is all they can do right now. The Delaware River, which borders the airport, confines the airport to the small restricted space.
Other regional airports, besides Atlantic City, are being considered. Not too far away, and open for service, is Delaware’s Wilmington Airport; it saw brief airline service with SkyBus. To the west, where you have a good number of PHL users, there isn’t too much. It resurrects my recollection of the glory days of when Wings Field, just 45 minutes northwest (by car), was the state’s third largest airport; and it had airline service. Those days are long over now that there are plenty of highways to transport you much quicker to surrounding areas.
It’s such a loss to Philadelphia International Airport if carriers shift flights. However, if it HAS to be done, then so be it – at this point, I see Atlantic City as more of a hassle than anything else.
United Air Lines announced yesterday that they will be moving to the new cashless cabin, the new method for purchasing items on-board, following several other prominent carriers who have already done so. They will begin to phase out cash completely and only allow debit and credit cards for making purchases. The new policy will take effect on March 23rd, however, cash will likely be accepted after the day for a short while during a transition period. Overseas flights will still accept both cash and the plastic option.
