JetBlue Airways (Nasdaq: JBLU) today filed with
the United States Department of Transportation a "capital-to-capital"
application for four beyond-perimeter slot exemptions to launch new
nonstop service from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport to two
unique and sought-after destinations: San Juan, Puerto Rico and Austin, Texas.
JetBlue's proposed new flights would be the only nonstop service
between the U.S. capital's preferred business airport and the capitals
of Puerto Rico and Texas
- both of which are located beyond the airport's 1,250-mile perimeter
and are among the 10 largest markets without nonstop air service to
Reagan National.
Award-winning JetBlue intends to offer one daily nonstop roundtrip flight to San Juan's Luiz Munoz Marin International Airport, with connecting service to St. Thomas, the capital of the United States Virgin Islands, as well as one daily nonstop roundtrip flight to Austin-Bergstrom International Airport. Both routes are supported by the two communities and their respective leaders.
"JetBlue's proposed new service to San Juan and Austin will provide tremendous benefit to the traveling public," said Robert Land,
JetBlue's senior vice president of government affairs and associate
general counsel. "JetBlue has long had a simple formula for deciding
which markets to serve: we look for routes that are underserved,
overpriced, or both. The markets from our nation's capital to San Juan and Austin fit that bill, and would be well-served with the addition of new nonstop JetBlue flights."
JetBlue is Puerto Rico's largest airline, with service between the Commonwealth and 11 nonstop destinations throughout the U.S. mainland and the Caribbean. JetBlue will further strengthen its connection to the island later this spring when it launches two new destinations from San Juan: Newark, N.J. on April 25 and West Palm Beach, Fla. on May 15. Since its debut on the island a decade ago, the number of fliers traveling with JetBlue to/from San Juan has grown an average of 28 percent each year.
JetBlue launched service from Reagan National in November 2010,
after more than a decade of attempting to enter the tightly restricted
market. Despite being a small, limited incumbent carrier at highly
concentrated Reagan National, JetBlue has stimulated traffic, lowered
fares, and garnered significant support in the capital region as a
result of its low fares and unique brand of customer service.
The airline currently offers a business-friendly schedule of seven daily roundtrip flights between Reagan National and Boston as well as daily service to its focus cities in Fort Lauderdale and Orlando, Fla., where connections are available to destinations across the Caribbean and Latin America. This June, JetBlue plans to expand service to Boston to ten roundtrip flights per day, add more flights to Fort Lauderdale and Orlando, and launch a new nonstop route to Tampa, Fla.
Source: JetBlue
========================================================
