12-15-2010, 12:30 PM
ATA was the last airline to try service from Hilo to the mainland. IIRC, they began as daily, then went to four times a week, and were only doing it once a week when they folded. A lot of people in the airline industry felt that it could have worked if ATA had done a redeye instead of a daylight flight from Hilo to the west coast, thus allowing for easy onward connections to points eastward. Despite ATA's cozy relationship with Southwest, the only practical connections out of OAK were to Chicago Midway and about three points in the Mountain West. Continental not only is doing a redeye out of Hilo, but they have a great feeder network for connecting passengers in both directions. Also, their pending merger with United will dramatically increase the mainland feed. Let's hope this works because it could make East Hawaii far more accessible.