AirTran to abandon SRQ in 2012

SARASOTA -- AirTran Airways will discontinue flights to Sarasota Bradenton International Airport in August.

A statement from AirTran parent Southwest Airlines says its Orlando-based subsidiary will discontinue service at six airports later this year, including Allentown, Pa. (ABE); Lexington, Ky. (LEX); Harrisburg, Pa. (MDT); Huntsville, Ala. (HSV); and White Plains, N.Y. (HPN).

AirTran first began serving Sarasota passengers at the end of 2004, with direct flights to Atlanta and Baltimore, and has since added routes to Boston, Chicago, Indianapolis and Milwaukee. AirTran flights carried roughly 365,000 of the passengers that traveled through Sarasota Bradenton International in 2011, roughly 30% of all traffic. Officials say AirTran passengers are worth about $1 million to the airport in food and parking revenues; the airport's annual budget hovers around $22 million.

The AirTran departure stung airport President and CEO Rick Piccolo, who calls it “confusing and disappointing.” Piccolo says in his 40 years of working at airports, this was the first time, out of six or so others, that a departing airline announced its departure over a phone call.

Moreover, Piccolo says AirTran's passenger count, about 365,000 a year, dwarfed the tally in other cities where the airline kept service, like Key West and Des Monies, Iowa. Those airports have fewer than 70,000 AirTran passengers a year, says Piccolo.

A Southwest spokeswoman cited SRQ's seasonal traffic and its proximity to larger airports in Tampa and Fort Myers as main reasons for the move. Southwest flies dozens of daily flights a day in those airports to the north and south.

Piccolo and a bevy of other disappointed local business and economic development leaders are now looking to the future. One cushion, says Piccolo, is AirTran will still pay SRQ about $1 million a year through 2014, part of the contract to lease gates at the terminal. “I don't want to diminish it,” Piccolo tells Coffee Talk, “but it's not catastrophic.”

Airport officials, meanwhile, have already begun to call other airlines, both ones that already serve SRQ and ones that don't. The pitch, says Piccolo, is that AirTran made money of its flights at SRQ, so another airline can, too. “Given the size and scope of the operation here,” Piccolo says, “this is a good opportunity.”