JetBlue shifting flights from Long Beach
JetBlue Airways is sharply reducing flights at Long Beach Airport after plans for international expansion there were blocked by Long Beach City Council.
Lawmakers finally rejected a proposal for a U.S. Customs station that JetBlue was seeking so it could begin international service.
That was blocked last year and now JetBlue is ‘moving on.’
It is cutting capacity by a third at Long Beach with daily departures dropping to 23 from the current 35 starting in September.
Referring to the City Council decision, Marty St. George, JetBlue’s executive vice president for commercial and planning said: "We thought we had an agreement very early on. They changed their mind. We have to move on."
"Revising our schedule allows us to offer customers new destinations, capitalize on our leadership position in transcontinental flying and advance our margin commitments in Long Beach where certain flying constraints have created challenges," St. George added.
The airline has also had a long running battle over airport noise abatement with the airline frequently falling foul of the city’s strict night time flying curfew.
It racked up more than $1 million in fines last year, much of which the airline disputed as ‘erroneous and unjustified.’
Some of JetBlue’s capacity will now go to Los Angeles area airport Ontario which it last served a decade ago, and it will add more flights out of Burbank.
JetBlue will add a new daily flight from Burbank to Boston and a second flight a day to New York JFK starting on September 5.
Long Beach Airport sees JetBlue’s pullback as an opportunity to offer more competition.
"We see this as an opportunity to create a better balance among the air carriers serving Long Beach Airport and one that will maintain our existing service, and in fact will likely lead to new markets in the very near future," said Long Beach Airport director Jess L. Romo.
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