Want to fly to Fort Leonard Wood from Lambert Field? How about Burlington, Iowa? Come Oct. 7, you can do that again.
Great Lakes Airlines will pick up where RegionsAir left off and resume two daily flights from Lambert to both small cities, airport officials said Tuesday.
Both were among the nine airports that lost Lambert flights in March, when RegionsAir, a Tennessee-based feeder for American Airlines, shut down after a dispute with the Federal Aviation Administration. None of the nine cities has seen service resume yet.
In March, Great Lakes won a federally-subsidized Essential Air Service contract to fly from Lambert to Fort Leonard Wood, Burlington and three Illinois cities: Quincy, Decatur, and Marion.
Those flights were supposed to start around June 1, but the airline delayed, saying it did not have enough planes. And with RegionsAir out of business, the flights have not run in months.
It's not clear when flights will start to the three Illinois cities, said Great Lakes spokeswoman Monica Taylor, as the airline is still awaiting more planes.
The Burlington and Fort Leonard Wood routes will be Great Lakes' first at Lambert, and it does not yet have a code share agreement in place with any of the major airlines there. Those agreements streamline ticket-buying and connections and are common between regional airlines and major carriers at hubs.
Great Lakes is in talks with Frontier Airlines and United Airlines, both of which it works with in Denver, Taylor said, as well as American Airlines, Lambert's biggest carrier.
