May 3—The Owensboro-Daviess County Regional Airport board decided Tuesday in a special called meeting to remove Charlotte, North Carolina, as a flight destination for the airport's essential air service in favor of Chicago, Illinois.
According to Chairman Doug Hoyt, the board spent more than an hour in closed session discussing the option that recently came from Contour Airlines, which is to become the airport's next essential air carrier.
"Through discussions with Contour in the last week, we were presented another opportunity," Hoyt said. "...Instead of having service to Charlotte, we could have service to Chicago."
Hoyt said the board voted unanimously to modify its proposal for jet service from Owensboro to Chicago to the U.S. Department of Transportation, which had approved Contour as the airport's new EAS just days after the board's April 18 regular meeting.
"We're extremely proud that we will be the only airport in this region that provides jet service to Chicago; it's not provided out of Evansville," Hoyt said.
In January, the airport board recommended Contour Airlines as its new EAS carrier. Initially, the agreement was for Contour to offer 12 flights a week to Charlotte.
But with the change, Contour will provide the same number of flights to Chicago O'Hare International Airport.
Tristan Durbin, airport director, said he doesn't expect the DOT to take as long to approve the destination switch since it has already given its blessing to Contour as the new EAS.
"This really opens up Owensboro to the world," Durbin said. "It's one of the largest hubs in the United States. It's something we're really excited about and really looking forward to."
According to chicagoairportguide.com, Chicago O'Hare offers flights to 46 countries and handles between 2.5 to 3 million passengers monthly. It was the fourth busiest airport in the world in 2022, according to preliminary global air traffic figures.
When Contour makes its transition to the Owensboro airport, it will replace current EAS provider Cape Air, which offers daily flights to St. Louis and Nashville. Cape Air gave notice last year that it was withdrawing as a provider with EAS to multiple stations, including Owensboro. It cited inflation demands as the cause.
Cape Air did rebid to return as the EAS carrier but with fewer flight options. In its new proposal, Cape Air gave two options — three times daily to St. Louis or two times to Nashville and one time to St. Louis daily.
The airport board, however, decided to go with Contour.
Cape Air will remain the EAS carrier until Contour is operational.
The airport receives $1 million a year in grant funding from the Federal Aviation Administration based on having 10,000 enplanements annually.
Enplanements are the boarding of an aircraft by a revenue passenger, including an original, stopover or transfer boarding of the aircraft.
Durbin said he expects this decision to help boost more air traveler interest from both a leisure and business standpoint.
"I think we'll have more enplanements from the community going to Chicago than Charlotte," Durbin said. "...It kind of differentiates us a little bit from other local options."
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