The Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport today released results from the informal online survey that was conducted earlier this year.
“The public is confirming more than they ever have that price is important, especially in this economy,” said Joe Feiertag, the airport’s public affairs manager, who oversaw the survey. “It shows that we have to continue to work hard to keep these low fares and continue talking with low fare carriers and incumbent carriers to keep price message out there.”
The results are a bit anticlimactic. Hub tenant Delta Air Lines already lowered its Cincinnati fares on Feb. 6, and recent local traffic numbers suggest that passengers are returning from the region’s other five airports. Prior to that, CVG had been the nation’s most expensive airport for most of the last decade, according to federal data.
Still, the survey (co-sponsored by the region’s main chambers of commerce and economic development groups) elicited 17,000 responses. It shows just how willing travelers were to look at airports such as Dayton or Indianapolis because of the previous fare discrepancy; previous studies by the airport suggested that only 30 percent of local fliers or less used other airports.
“I hope that the exercise has succeeded in that it made the community aware of the situation, gave them an opportunity to express its opinion, and now we have a solution,” said Arlyn Easton, the former Kenton County Airport Board chairman who heads the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber’s air competition committee, which also helped create the survey.
“Now it’s vitally important that the region rise up and use CVG – we won’t keep these fares if people don’t use them.”
-from Enquirer.com
