Aug. 21--The fastest route from one point to another isn't always a straight line.
At least that's what Al Kremers and the others involved with attracting air service to St. Cloud might tell you about the process of returning daily commercial flights to St. Cloud Regional Airport.
The path to get them back after an absence of more than three years now has a new destination. On Tuesday morning, Kremers and a group of officials led by Mayor Dave Kleis held a news conference celebrating news that Allegiant Air will begin flying from St. Cloud to Orlando Sanford International Airport in Sanford, Fla., beginning Dec. 18.
Add those to existing Allegiant flights to Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport in Mesa, Ariz., which began last December, and for the first time, St. Cloud will have multiple commercial destinations. But the overarching goal, which area leaders have pursued for more than a decade, remains service to Chicago.
"This flight is one step closer to our goal, and the goal since we began our journey has been to have nonstop daily flights to Chicago," Kleis said. "This helps us get there."
The Orlando Sanford flights will be seasonal, running Wednesdays and Saturdays through April, according to Lindsay Hernquist, a public relations specialist with Allegiant. The St. Cloud route was one of 18 announcements Allegiant made with a flurry of news releases just after 4 a.m. Tuesday. Nine of those routes were into Orlando Sanford, marking the largest expansion in the history of that airport.
Orlando Sanford, which served about 200,000 passengers in June, is the smaller of two airports serving central Florida. Orlando International Airport served more than 3 million during the same period.
Finding Florida deal
Kremers, who has been in charge of the Greater St. Cloud Development Corp.'s air corps the past two years, said the initiative for the Florida flights came from Allegiant, which was happy with the success of its Phoenix-Mesa flights and did a marketing test to see whether Orlando Sanford would be a compatible destination for the area. Kremers had mentioned Orlando Sanford along with Denver and several other destinations in previous conversations with Eric Fletcher, manager of airport planning for Allegiant. Fletcher mentioned Orlando Sanford earlier this year in conversation again with Kremers.
"He wanted to know what kind of a deal we would have, the incentive for them coming," Kremers said. "It was on our list, not a high priority, but we'll take it."
Kleis said the only financial commitment to Allegiant for the Orlando Sanford flights is $12,500 a year in marketing dollars from the city for each of the next two years. The city receives more than $4 per passenger in fees.
"I believe we'll get that money back and then some," said Kleis, who on Tuesday booked a ticket to be on the first flight to Florida.
More than 15,000 people were on the Allegiant flights to Phoenix-Mesa in the first six months of this year. The flights to Orlando Sanford will be on similar-sized planes.
Service in St. Cloud
The GSDC previously made obligations of $225,000 to launch Allegiant's service in St. Cloud. Of that, GSDC President Patti Gartland said $198,150 has been raised by Kremers and Jami Bestgen, a consultant who has been involved in air service efforts.
"The business community stepped up to fund the startup expenses for the less-than-daily service," Gartland said. "It's paving the way for daily scheduled service."
The Phoenix-Mesa flight required re-establishing the Transportation Safety Administration and completion of a required environmental assessment at the airport, which was without commercial service after Delta Air Lines left in 2009. Marketing efforts also have targeted getting people thinking about using the airport again.
A $750,000 Small Community Air Service Development grant remains set aside for use in securing the Chicago flights. The federal money requires a match of $250,000 by local entities. According to Gartland, $100,000 has been raised from private companies and another $31,000 from the public sector. That leaves a little more than $119,000 left to raise if the entire $750,000 is to be used. But Kleis said the $750,000 is only to be used as a guarantee, and he's not certain all of the money would be needed.
"If the flights are successful, as we think they'll be, we might not need all that money anyway," Kleis said.
Airport Manager Bill Towle said there's still about a year left in the window with which to use the federal grant, and he was confident it could be extended. Kremers said efforts to get service to Chicago "are very close" with another airline and that the service would be on 50-seat jets.
"But we want to keep options open until we have a firm commitment," Kremers said. "We're always hopeful."
There also could be other flights coming soon.
"We were hoping to have a doubleheader this morning," Kremers said. "There's one or two waiting in the wings."
Copyright 2013 - St. Cloud Times, Minn.
