Airport in Cape working to add flight

A grant-funded effort to add a fourth daily round-trip flight from Cape Girardeau to St. Louis still hasn't gotten off the ground 10 months after federal Department of Transportation officials announced the funding.

But Bruce Loy, Cape Girardeau Regional Airport manager, said a fourth commercial flight should be added by July or August provided that local businesses commit $100,000 up front to pay for air travel on their expected business trips.

That's needed to help fund the $125,000 local match required to utilize a $500,000 federal grant, Loy said.

Loy said businesses have expressed interest in participating in the financing scheme and he is confident that the funding soon will be in place.

He said while the grant was announced in June, city officials didn't receive the necessary paperwork from the federal government until last fall.

Loy said the city plans to kick in $25,000 for a marketing campaign to boost airport use.

The other $100,000 is expected to come from businesses that would put money into travel trust accounts. The accounts would be used by those businesses to pay for their commercial travel to and from the Cape Girardeau airport, Loy said.

Industrial recruiter Mitch Robinson said an added flight would make it more convenient to fly to and from Cape Girardeau on business.

Robinson, executive director of the Cape Girardeau Area Industrial Recruitment Association, said many of the travelers flying out of Cape Girardeau are bound for Chicago on a connecting flight in St. Louis.

"A lot of those are just business trips that could be done in just one day with the additional round-trip flight," he said.

But Robinson said service won't be expanded without business support. "We have to put up our share of the money to make that happen," he said.

Loy has invited local business people from some dozen companies in the Cape Girardeau area to attend a luncheon meeting on Tuesday at the airport to discuss the funding plan. But Loy said there's room for more. Loy said those who want to attend the meeting should contact him at 334-6230.

Frequent fliers

Loy said the city and the commuter airline want a commitment from companies such as Procter & Gamble which have operations that involve a lot of business trips.

The meeting will include a presentation by airline consultant Beth Anderson of Minneapolis, who will explain the "travel bank" system. Anderson has been developing the financing plan for the city. The head of Corporate Airlines, which provides the American Airlines-affiliated commuter service, also is scheduled to attend.

The federal grant will be used to pay $36,000 to Anderson and $25,000 for marketing expenses in addition to the city's share, airline officials said.

Loy said the city has been paying the consultant in anticipation of receiving the federal money. Once the local match is in place, the city will be reimbursed from the grant as expenses are incurred.

Corporate Airlines president Doug Caldwell said his Smyrna, Tenn.-based airline will receive most of the grant money, amounting to about $400,000.

Corporate Airlines, doing business as American Connection, also will get some of the travel trust money although much of that will go to the carriers such as American Airlines, who provide the connecting flights in St. Louis, Caldwell said.

Cape Girardeau was one of 40 communities nationwide last year to receive grant money under the pilot program.

The funding is a one-year subsidy, Caldwell said. It doesn't cover Corporate Airlines' total expense for an added flight, he said.

"If this turns out to be a lemon, we are at risk," he said.

It costs the airline about $2,000 to make a round-trip flight from Cape Girardeau to St. Louis, Caldwell said.

The airline's flights to and from Cape Girardeau in 19-passenger planes have been about half full over the past year. Caldwell said similar usage of a fourth flight would be enough for his airline to continue offering the expanded service once the federal grant runs out.

Cape Girardeau currently is served by three round-trip flights on weekdays, but the earliest arrival time is 11:14 a.m. Loy said that's late for business people wanting to conduct work and return to St. Louis by the end of the day.

Caldwell said adding a round-trip flight would probably result in the first daily flight from St. Louis arriving at 9 a.m. or 10 a.m. Cape Girardeau's first departure flight of the day probably would occur about 6 a.m., an hour earlier than the current departure time, he said.

Caldwell said the "ticket trust," which is operated through banks, has become standard practice at smaller airports wanting to boost passenger travel.

Loy said the financing scheme won't be an added cost to businesses. He said companies simply would be using some of their existing travel budgets to fly in and out of Cape Girardeau.

If the contributing companies have any money left over in their ticket trust at the end of 12 months, they would receive it back in the form of vouchers for future flights to and from the Cape Girardeau airport, Loy said.

mbliss@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 123