Appearance v truth. Many small and rural airports are losing airline service due changing economics across aviation. But these changes are putting these airports in the crosshairs of exciting new opportunities.
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“You can’t handle the truth”
It was the signature line by Marine Colonel Nathan Jessup in the movie, A Few Good Men.
It is also appropriate for a lot of small communities across the USA that have lost scheduled passenger air service, as well as others going in the same direction. They can’t handle the truth – especially when it involves future opportunities.
There are lots of hand-wringing news stories about how these communities are facing economic doom. However, the truth is that evolution of air transportation economics, and in the role aviation plays as a communication channel are the reasons. The shifts in air service realities are part of a wider evolution in aviation, and airports at small communities are actually looking down the throat of what are huge future opportunities as a result.
A number of small communities are facing this but are still sadly mesmerized by chasing new airline service, instead of the wider future picture.
Are such airports really losing air service? No question about it. For a lot of communities, the potential for scheduled flights at the local airport is evaporating, due to raw economic gravity. In a number of small communities, the costs now exceed the ability to support connective air service at the local airport. That means airport and aviation planning need to change.
Handle This Truth – It Leads To The Future.
This “truth” also harbors new opportunities for small and rural airports. The evolution of aviation economic realities that are eliminating passengernservice at local small community airports are concurrently illuminating whole new business opportunities as well.
We could go into the proximate causal factors for the loss of air access at small community airports. There has been the demise of small airliners, the draw of better access at larger airports, the changes in air travel as a communication channel, and a number of other dynamics.
Here’s some truth that Colonel Jessup would point out. Economic gravity can be ignored for only so long. That includes small community air service development. In many cases, eventually responses to loss of air service run out of steam.
The angry denunciations of the airline industry, the sincere civic hubris, the enthusiastic local “task forces,” and lots of advocacy studies concocted by paid consultants – they won’t change the truth. Neither will pro-tem federal subsidy programs.
But here is the whole story. The factors driving these changes in airline operations are part of major shifts in the roles of aviation within the USA economy. Within this is the future of small airports, if they bother to recognize it. Lots of opportunities are coming, based on future applications and trends in aviation.
There is life after scheduled flights. But today, too many small communities are spending lots of tax dollars on schemes to bring back the past. In the long run, they will universally fail.
Handling The Truth: Let Go Of Past Business Models
This past week, we had two poster-child events that prove conclusively that new airport planning approaches are imperative for a lot of communities.
Let’s start on the East Coast. Seems that a small airport was recently informed that its only carrier, American Airlines, was cutting daily flights to its global hub at Charlotte from three down to two. That is a hit – because schedule frequency is a key driver of consumer air traffic demand.
But not to worry. According to media reports, the community plans to move aggressively and file for a federal Small Community Air Service Development (SCASD) grant to “lure” a second airline to town.
On the surface to most people, that sounds great. The sad part of this is that the community is simply reacting to the proximate issue, which is the loss of a daily flight, instead of handling the factors causing it.
A quick glance at federal traffic and other data for this airport reveals instantly that American Airlines was probably losing its financial lunch at this airport, and this reduction in frequency is probably just the starting point for eventually dropping all service to this airport.
In this case, the truth is not pretty. The percentage of seats filled at this airport throughout 2025 hovered in the high forties in some months, and on a yearly basis, the airport could barely get a 50% of the seats filled. That is appalling. The concept of this market attracting a second airline is outside the guard rails of reality.
Notwithstanding whatever outside advice this community may be paying for, it’s pretty clear that they need a latter-day Colonel Jessup to bluntly tell them that they aren’t handling the truth very well.
In point of fact, the Small Community Air Service Grant program was concocted over two decades ago and has little relationship with today’s air transportation economics. Furthermore, over the years it has actually assisted very few truly small communities in getting new flights. It has benefitted places like Spokane and Albany and Sarasota – all were already well served and hardly considered as “small communities.”
Therefore, grant will have no effect on air service at the airport we’re talking about – assuming they can be one of applicants selected.
In fact, any outside air service “experts” telling them to file a SCASD grant application, without clearly informing the community right up front of the less-than-lottery odds of success (a.k.a. the truth) are flatly unethical. Snake oil. Invoice bait.
The action by American Airlines at this airport is the precursor to more pink slips in the future. Like the Titanic after it hit the iceberg, it is an economic certainty that scheduled air service is not in the long-term future for this airport.
Contrary to traditional thinking, that’s not a commercial death sentence. Looking at the evolution of aviation trends, it is a clear signal that the community has new futurist business options.
The Need To Drop Past Assumptions – A Clear Example Out West
Contrary to traditional thinking, that’s not a commercial death sentence. Looking at the evolution of aviation trends, it is a clear signal that the community has new futurist business options.
The Need To Drop Past Assumptions – A Clear Example Out West
Let’s hop out to the Midwest, where civic leaders in Dubuque will be meeting soon to review whether to continue to subsidize a single daily 50-seat round trip flight to Chicago. It’s been in operation for a year, and it’s now clear that it’s not much more than an expensive air service placebo.
For some background, in 2022 American Airlines pulled the plug on its schedule of three 50-seat flights feeding its global hub at Chicago O’Hare International. Immediately, the community rose up in unified fervor to get air service back again. Meetings were held. Committees were formed. Outreach efforts toward other airlines were contemplated.
That was the good news, and an indication that Dubuque is alive and has a robust business community.
Unfortunately, the goal was to remediate the proximate issue, which was loss of airline flights. All of these efforts overlooked the core foundation for the service demise. Rising airline operational costs were in line to eclipse the passenger revenues Dubuque can generate. It’s true for American Airlines or any other network carrier.
At the time, the usual boogeyman used by the airline for any small community air service cuts was the “pilot shortage.” It was an anesthetic that they used to ease the pain. It also diverted the community from facing the real causes.
To be sure, the pilot shortage claim was true, but not necessarily based on the number of staff needed to eventually fill American’s cockpits. There was – and is – a shortage of low-paid pilots. And also, there is an emerging shortage of low-paid cabin crew. And low-paid maintenance staff. The truth was that the operational cost of the service was gravitating away from the revenue that Dubuque could generate at the local airport. Increasing airline labor and other costs were cancelling out the viability of small airliner operations.
Also reflected in this economic gravity was something called re-fleeting. The 50-seat jets applied by American at Dubuque (and other small communities) were being phased out, due to the fact they were becoming un-economic. Larger airliners were in the pipeline.
With two to three daily flights on these smaller jets, Dubuque was filling only around 60% of the seats. American was facting the need to shift into larger, more efficient 76-seat jets. Dubuque’s traffic generation could not make the cut. It was strictly a business decision to drop the market.
The aforementioned airport on the East Coast may want to benefit from a look at Dubuque’s post-American Airlines strategy. Dubuque also applied for – and won – a $1.5 million Small Community Air Service Development grant 2023.
According to the hype around this legislation, this grant would be instrumental in recruiting a replacement for American Airlines. Unfortunately, as noted above, this program is an obsolete total failure in achieving big results for genuinely small communities, such as Dubuque.
And that’s exactly what happened. The best that DBQ could “lure” with this grant (combined with massive additional local contributions) was a single daily round trip to Chicago, with a small 50-seat jet operated by Denver Air Connection, which is the dba for a tiny airline called Key Lime Air.
Now, after a full year of flights, Key Lime is filling just 36% of seats available. Reportedly, it is operating highly reliably – including a reliable cash burn of the community’s subsidy funds.
The city noted to the local media that they have spent a total of about $3.6 million in the past year, equating to a per-passenger subsidy of something like $275 each.
Now, Dubuque faces the challenge of handling the truth. It does not have enough demand to support even Key Lime Air, let alone attract any network carrier. They can stick with this lost dead-end program.
Handle The Truth – Embrace The New Logistics
Or they can move on and discover and recognize that the same changes that zapped local scheduled service also represent new future opportunities. Changes in aviation have resulted in Dubuque losing scheduled passenger flights. But those changes are only part of the emerging transition of aviation into other opportunity areas.
For Dubuque, it needs to recognize that Cedar Rapids – a well-served airport about an hour away – will be its air service gateway. For the other airport back East, their gateway is an airport 90 minutes away, but it’s one with high service levels – to three major connecting hubs. Actually, in many cases this can represent less total travel time than trying to shoehorn travel to adjust to just two flights a day to connect at Charlotte from the local airport.
It’s Been Evolving For Decades
This air service gravity has been in play for 40 years.
So, it’s time to take stock of the future at a lot of small community airports. They can continue to chase vapor clouds and tilt at windmills trying to restore passenger air service that’s gone forever, or handle the truth and build a new aviation future for the local airport.
They just need to look beyond the obvious.
The Future? The Passenger Gate Is A Distraction
The new future for small community local airports is in committing to comprehensive aviation planning, not just scheduled service.
The big picture is that the factors eliminating scheduled air service viability at these airports are actually part of the evolution of aviation itself, including new applications of air logistics and the changes in technology.
So, the need is to divert some of that energy and funding to address the future. Every airport is FAA-required to have an Airport Layout Plan that depicts the facilitiy’s geographic map. What’s needed is to transform it into an Airport Economic Opportunity Plan. Airports might want to look beyond what their role was 30 years ago.
Anybody taken a look at the core trends in business and executive aviation? Growing by leaps and bounds, these are $50 million to $70 million aircraft, and they don’t fit well at O’Hare or LaGuardia or LAX. Think about it – and how uncrowded and ground accessible small airport can fill a new aviation opportunity.
Anybody take delivery of an Amazon package, lately? Airports are a critical part of this system. It’s more than just having a ramp to park a cargo plane. Distribution and logistics – ground and air. Speed and efficiency.
What about the retirement of aircraft and powerplant technicians, formerly known as mechanics? The skills needed today are entirely different from 20 years ago. Anybody want to take that thought and run with it regarding airport opportunities? Say, next-tech training academies.
And jumping into harsh realities, where is the quality of life better for an aviation supplier company? The LA Basin, or Chicago, or Portland? Or maybe at places like Williamsport?
This is just barely scratching the surface.
Time to handle the future truth – and it’s rife with opportunities for small communities and their airports across the USA, even if passenger service isn’t viable.
America has invested billions in a comprehensive airport system. Time to handle the truth: it is going to pay off.