RSS
Twitter
Facebook
YouTube
The Columbus Dispatch wrote
Chicago, New York on Skybus’ radar
Friday, October 26, 2007
Having cut most of its West Coast flights, Skybus Airlines is now looking to add shorter, more-profitable flights.
Niagara Falls, N.Y., Gary, Ind., and several greater-New York City area airports are among those reportedly talking to Skybus. An airline spokesman declined to comment, reiterating that Skybus continues to talk to a number of airports about adding service.
In another industry, Skybus Airlines might be able to take a breather: It’s carried more than 400,000 passengers in its first five months, is serving 12 cities with five planes and has attracted incentives valued at more than $100 million from Columbus and Greensboro, N.C., which is set to become the airline’s next operations hub.
Let’s hope!
Related Stories:
- JetBlue To Drop Columbus Service
- Skybus may suspend some flights to West Coast
shit that would be sweet as hell!
Forget Chicago, I’ve been waiting for a direct flight to Gary for years!
http://cbs2chicago.com/topstories/Gary.murder.homicides.2.323747.html
http://cbs2chicago.com/topstories/Gary.murder.homicides.2.323747.html
Hey, I lived right by Gary for over a year and I was only violently assaulted once!
I have to say on first glance I’m probably most excited for the trip to Niagara Falls since it’s an actual flight into the city of Niagara.
How difficult is it to get from Gary to Chicago? Is there train service?
Either way, it’s probably not too bad if you can score $10 tickets to Chicago or NYC. After they bump up a few notches though I wonder how many people are going to pay for Skybus to those cities when they can pay just a little more to fly another airline into the main airports instead?
Yep, there’s train service– I took the train from Randolph Street to South Bend and we stopped in Gary. It’s not a bad ride and it’s very very cheap. Although I don’t know how you’d get to the Gary stop from the airport (don’t know where the airport is). Anyway, here’s the train I took:
[url]http://www.nictd.com/[/url]
Looks like the train does stop at the Gary Airport:
http://www.nictd.com/service/SystemMap.pdf
I hope they do start this service…one more option in my continuing anti-O’Hare agenda.
http://www.nictd.com/service/SystemMap.pdf
I hope they do start this service…one more option in my continuing anti-O’Hare agenda.
I took this train to Chicago everyday for a year and it does not stop at the Gary Airport. It stops close to the airport, but you need to find transportation from the airport to the train stop.
Looks like there’s a $1 shuttle from Newburgh (Stewart) Airport to Metro-North’s train station in Beacon.
http://www.stewartintlairport.com/groundtrans.html
http://www.mta.nyc.ny.us/mnr/html/mnrmap.htm
Although the Metro-North drops you off in Harlem and leaves you with a subway connection to Grand Central.
Not as convenient as flying into one of NYC’s big 3, byt not all that bad if you can get some cheap tickets.
Who would fly to Gary (presumably to get close to Chicago) when you can ride MegaBus (an actual bus) to Chicago’s city center for the same price or less? Your transit time (including early arrival at the airport and transfer to the city) is probably pretty similar. Heck, it’s only a six hour drive to Chicago.
Anyway, I think SkyBus is at risk of becoming too regional (and totally unappealing) if they keep concentrating on flying to nearby places. Mainly, I’m pissed because they cancelled my flights to Bellingham in Feb. They’re obviously going after the leisure traveler market, and the subset of that market that is more concerned about price than amenities. I probably fit into that category, but I want to go on vacation somewhere cool. Not Gary, not Biloxi and not St. Louis. How about Savannah or Charleston or Austin or Portland, Maine? Or somewhere in the Rockies for ski season?
I agree on Gary. I just flew into Midway on Southwest for $120 roundtrip. You can usually find United and American fares for about the same price into O’hare.
Skybus might end up being a touch cheaper, but once you factor in the taxi to the train station and the longer train ride into Chicago, it’s not really baiting me to go. Chicago is already rediculously cheap. They’d be better off giving me a cheap flight to Bellingham!
This is sure to sound paranoid, please forgive me for it upfront. But. Is it my gut that’s telling me that Skybus is lessening the focus on Columbus fast? Yes, yes, I know that they had planned to add several focus cities, but Greensboro came real quick, didn’t it? I looked at their website and now we share the spotlight with Greensboro lit up, where it used to just have Columbus. Since there are many Columbus investors, they wouldn’t move the headquarters for big money given as incentives, in say, Greensboro? I am fully aware that I don’t know what I’m talking about, but it’s not even off the ground yet and they’re cancelling failed flights to the west coast and adding new major focus city lickety split– with how many planes? Five? Why so soon? It doesn’t sit well with me for some reason.
Not even close to similar.
From: http://megabus.com/us/schedules/columbus_chicago.php
Schedules for Columbus to Chicago
Columbus, COTA Express Transit Terminal,
leave – - 11:30 AM – 10:50 PM
Chicago, Union Station
arrive 5:15 PM 6:20 AM
Schedules for Chicago to Columbus
Chicago, Union Station
leave 11:00 AM 10:00 PM
Columbus, COTA Express Transit Terminal
arrive – 6:35 PM – - 7:10 AM
Average transit time: 7 hours 22 minutes each direction.
Train from Gary to Chiago takes 50 minutes. They leave pretty much every hour. Flight from CMH to Gary would be less than one hour. Supposing you check in online and show up 45 minutes before your flight, your total transit time would be, at most, 50 minutes (train) + 1 hour (wait) + 1 hour (flight) + 45 minutes (airport) = 3 hours 35 minutes. So less than half the average amount of time it takes to ride the bus.
Btw, if that drive takes you 6 hours you drive like a grandma.
This is only an hour or so north of Portsmouth.
I think they have to start investing in new hubs if they’re going to stay viable for long. I don’t think they’re necessarily pulling out of Columbus – they’re just diversifying. They’ve got to get those new planes quick, though!
This is only an hour or so north of Portsmouth.
That’s true. (But as far as I know, Amtrak doesn’t take passengers from Portsmouth to Portland, so the alternative is renting a car.) My point is that I think SB will have more sucess flying to places people want to go instead of places that are cheap to fly to. The reason RyanAir and EasyJet work is that they started out flying into low cost airports that had quick, easy, frequent ground transit links to places that people want to visit. Our national rail system is woefully inadequate in most of the country. After the Euro LCCs gained market share, they could afford bigger airports, which brought even more success. I’m pulling for SkyBus to succeed, but I don’t understand their strategy trying to fill daily flights to Chicopee and Chattanooga.
This is only an hour or so north of Portsmouth.
That’s true. (But as far as I know, Amtrak doesn’t take passengers from Portsmouth to Portland, so the alternative is renting a car.)
Just an FYI. You can take a shuttle or taxi from Portsmouth to Dover and then hop on Amtrak’s Downeaster to go up to Portland.
This is only an hour or so north of Portsmouth.
That’s true. (But as far as I know, Amtrak doesn’t take passengers from Portsmouth to Portland, so the alternative is renting a car.) My point is that I think SB will have more sucess flying to places people want to go instead of places that are cheap to fly to. The reason RyanAir and EasyJet work is that they started out flying into low cost airports that had quick, easy, frequent ground transit links to places that people want to visit. Our national rail system is woefully inadequate in most of the country. After the Euro LCCs gained market share, they could afford bigger airports, which brought even more success. I’m pulling for SkyBus to succeed, but I don’t understand their strategy trying to fill daily flights to Chicopee and Chattanooga.
+1
I wanted to share this article even though the Gary service isn’t to CMH but to Greensboro. But who knows. With Skybus announcing shorter hops, we could see Gary-CMH service added sometime soon.
Passenger air service returning next month
Jon Hilkevitch
February 25, 2008
Never able to compete with the stardom of Chicago’s two airports, Gary-Chicago, a busy air-cargo facility, has been forced to settle for an occasional cameo as a functioning passenger airport. There has been no regular passenger service at Gary since SkyValue USA ended all flights last year after five months of flying.
But the Indiana airport’s boosters, who have long touted Gary-Chicago as the answer to the Chicago region’s need for a third commercial airport, are once again preparing to get passenger service airborne.
The fledgling low-cost carrier Skybus Airlines is scheduled to launch service on March 13 from Gary-Chicago. It will consist of two daily flights to Greensboro, N.C., and two return trips to Gary each day on Airbus A319 jets outfitted with 156 seats.
Meanwhile, airport officials are planning for expansion.
READ MORE