ABIA: One Million a Month
 

From the Austin Business Journal
http://austin.bizjournals.com/austin...l?surround=lfn

ABIA traffic takes off
Austin Business Journal - 4:15 PM CDT Friday, June 29, 2007

A record number of passengers travelled through Austin-Bergstrom International Airport in May.

Passenger traffic for the month increased to 781,855, up 6 percent compared with last year. The total number of people departing from ABIA totaled 408,004 for the month, an increase of 6.5 percent compared with May 2006.

Southwest Airlines [NYSE: LUV] ushered the largest number of passengers through the doors of ABIA, 270,068, up 3 percent compared with last year. ABIA officials also announced that Southwest will add a non-stop flight between Austin and Denver. Southwest will become the third airline to offer the direct flight, bringing the number of daily non-stop flights between the two cities to eight.

ABIA's air cargo activity, however, did not fair as well. Air cargo for May 2007 was down 4 percent compared to last year, totaling 18,536,603 lbs.

Rad,

I once read the growth trigger plan and I believe the number was around 8-9 million passengers in a year and they would begin the terminal expansion. My guess is we will hear and announcement for this to happen in the next 2-3 years. We should be around 8 million right now making it the 5th busiest airport in the state behind both Dallas and Houston area airports and about 1.5 million more passengers than SA.... this is mainly due to the heavy business/international business travel the Austin market sees in addition to huge global draws like SXSW and ACL and a fast growing convention business in contrast to the tourist/convention travel SA sees [this is a generalization of specifics].

SA I believe will hit 8million this year. Austin's is only busier by about 40k passengers a year. (might want to check the numbers on that, been a while since ive seen the stats) SA is in the process of a multi million dollar renovation which will replace the super old terminal and add on a third terminal. This is all due to the ever increasing business climate and the already stong tourist and convention business. Total number of gates once completed will be around 36.

Yeah... SA is around 7.5 mil so I expect it to hit 8 very soon. Austin will be slightly above 9 mil once the calendar year is complete. At both compouned growth rates of 6% they'll maintain that general separation.

What would be really beneficial to the economy is if SA and and Austin combined on a high speed rail to a hub airport between the cities... not that this will happen in our lifetime most likely but you would see a lot of major corporate relos to the greater area.

Our airports greatly limit corporate headquarter relocation.

Just checked the numbers, last year ABIA was at 8,200,000 and SAT was right at 8,000,000...it was a less that 200,000 passenger diff.

I got a chuckle out of this extrapolation. Reminds me of all the 1999 headlines indicating the DOW was heading for 22,000.

Pretty amazing the little town up north is running more passengers than its big sister metropolis to the south.

Just an FYI:

ABIA is already working on the logistics of the first phase of expansion - adding 6 gates to the east wing (for a total of 31 gates in the “North Terminal,” a.k.a., the Barbara Jordan Terminal). However, there is currently no construction start date.

With regards to PAX...Official numbers (as reported by each airport) were8,261,310 for ABIA and 8,031,405 for SAIA in 2006. Both airports are growing at roughly the same rate (~+8% year-on-year in 2006 and ~+6% year-on-year in 2007).

As for hitting the 9 million PAX mark at ABIA in 2007; it's a long shot and most likely not achievable. My guess is that PAX for 2007 will be in the neighborhood of 8.7-8.8 million.

rad, and this is for everyone else also, you need to cite the source and the author of articles. Please post both the name of the media outlet, in this case the Austin Business Journal, and the author of the article. In some cases no author is listed, mostly in Associated Press articles, but that's fine then, as long as you list the media outlet. I fixed it, but please in the future make sure to do that.

sorry bout that Kev

ABIA Overrun by Clowns
Source: Rad707's Brain

July 1, 2006

Austin's famed airport, known for its conspicuous lack of Starbucks and McDonalds, was overrun by clowns today.

The clowns came to a surprise to many of the aging, hipster rock stars that were arriving from gigs around the country. "We started swinging at them with our guitars...fucking clowns" said SWA #323 passenger Julio Perez, "Who let them through security? Rubber balloons may not contain explosives, but they should have to check that shit."

To date, it is uncertain where these clowns came from, but as sources come forward, Rad707's brain will be there with full coverage.

lol.