05-11-2019, 03:53 AM
While I hope Harry is right, it won't be truly believable until Southwest makes an official announcement. ITO's underutilized facilities are certainly available, that's for sure.
This may eventually prove to be somewhat of a "watch out what you wish for" scenario. Southwest could siphon off enough of United's ITO-LAX traffic to cause them to end service here. The United flight is a redeye, which a lot of people don't like, but it puts passengers into LAX with easy onward connections all over North America. Southwest doesn't currently do redeyes and is likely to dump Hilo passengers into Oakland too late to connect much farther east.
Having said all that, competition is good, and I hope Southwest goes all out for our business.
This may eventually prove to be somewhat of a "watch out what you wish for" scenario. Southwest could siphon off enough of United's ITO-LAX traffic to cause them to end service here. The United flight is a redeye, which a lot of people don't like, but it puts passengers into LAX with easy onward connections all over North America. Southwest doesn't currently do redeyes and is likely to dump Hilo passengers into Oakland too late to connect much farther east.
Having said all that, competition is good, and I hope Southwest goes all out for our business.