Southwest Plans LaGuardia Presence

The Dallas Morning News reports that Southwest Airlines confirmed it is buying ATA Airlines for ATA's operating slots at LaGuardia Airport. A Southwest spokeswoman said, "The intent is not to operate ATA Airlines. The intent is to allow Southwest Airlines to acquire the LaGuardia slots." NBC New York directs us to Southwest's Leader Planner Bill Owen's blog post, "This isn’t just big news, it’s huge. GINORMOUS! I think h-e-double-hockey-sticks just froze over…and I am certain a number of my friends in this industry have yet to pick their jaws up off of the floor!" Owen then explains why LGA is so coveted--"it’s the closest major airport to Manhattan. What Love Field is to Dallas, Hobby Airport is to Houston, and Midway Airport is to Chicago, LaGuardia Airport is to New York City." Southwest does not fly to LGA or JFK or Newark--just MacArthur (so far).

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By Jen Chung in News on November 19, 2008 4:28 PM

Comments [rss]

vic3000

stradegy. mispelled in earlier post.

vic3000

The way things are now. I think a southwest would harm themselves by not being open to new stadegy. I hope they have success at LGA and I hope they even build a new Terminal although they don't need to at first. That would be way down the line.

NannyState

^ That's true, but I guess I meant terminals on the scale of a JFK or ORD :P

nycnewsjunkie

#15

"Southwest doesn't build terminals."

They just did at ISP.

NannyState

^Landing fees and slots. Southwest won't pay a high landing fee. And they'd have to build their own terminal. Southwest doesn't build terminals.

Gothamist_Cynic

Gah why not JFK? LaGuardia blows.

lindsayfunke

SWEET, flights into Love (when I visit home) are always cheaper than flights into DFW, but it's kind of a pain to get out to Islip.

Tower18

OMG this is so exciting!! I'm moving to NYC and I was really going to miss the convenient Southwest service I get at Chicago Midway.

NannyState

Fly Southwest to Bosnia.

longacre

#9: Not necessarily, since there is plenty of competition on the New York-Chicago route. American, United, JetBlue, Delta and Continental all fly to Midway and O'Hare from LaGuardia, JFK and Newark.

point72389

I have a feeling this will jack up the prices between New York and Chicago significantly because of the "added convenience". It's not far at all to take the LIRR from MacArthur for an hour and 15 minutes to Penn station when you consider that it costs like $50 each way to fly between the two cities.

STAY CHEAP SOUTHWEST!!

longacre

Matty: Southwest does not fly to Newark. You used to be able to book ATA Newark and LaGuardia flights through Southwest.

Pitch: Yes they do.

Pitch

Doesn't Southwest fly to Islip?

Toby von Meistersinger

Hopefully this will kill of some airlines that deserve to die *cough*USAir*cough*.

matty

or did i take ATA?

i forget.

anyway, this good cause southwest is cheap.

matty

southwest does too fly to newark

henricus

Honestly, by the time I get off a plane I'm at the point where 25 bucks to my apartment seems worth it.

breaknight

"What Love Field is to Dallas, Hobby Airport is to Houston, and Midway Airport is to Chicago, LaGuardia Airport is to New York City."

--Except with no reasonable way to get to Manhattan aside from a cab. And PLEASE don't tell me the M60 is "reasonable". I don't know about Houston or Dallas, but at least Midway has a subway stop.