Fares decrease at Dane Co. Airport

August 2009

It's all about the journey.

N E W S

In This Issue

Madison sees second largest fare decrease in the nation

Secure Flight now asks for birth date and gender

Win tickets to Denver or Vermont

US Airways to fly to Washington, D.C.

Travel agencies may save you money

Goodyear blimp visits airport

Fly to Viet Nam for $700 RT

DCRA has second largest fare decrease of nation's top 100 airports

Dane County Regional Airport had the second largest decrease in airfares from the 1st quarter of 2008 to the 1st quarter of 2009, for the top 100 airports in the country. Round-trip fares from Madison fell 16.7% to $375, a $76 decrease from a year ago. Rounding out the top five airports with the largest decreases were Cincinnati OH (1), Richmond VA (3), Long Beach CA (4) and San Francisco CA (5).

Passengers taking advantage of low fares

Year to date passenger activity for July 2009 shows a 4.9% increase in enplanements over 2008. In July '09 69,634 flew from DCRA, an 11.8% increase over July '08. June '08 enplanements of 67,971 were up 8.1% over June '08.

"Secure Flight" moves to asking for birth date and gender

As of August 15, U.S. airlines may begin asking for your date of birth and gender when making airline reservations. This is the second public phase of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) bringing the airlines and their passengers into the Secure Flight program. However, if you are not prompted to provide this information by your airline, don't be concerned, as it will not impact your travel. This step is being phased in as the airlines' computer systems adapt to processing the new data. TSA expects full implementation of the Secure Flight program by early 2010.

Secure Flight is a process that TSA and airlines collaborate on to compare the information you provide against government watch lists. The mission of Secure Flight is to enhance the security of domestic and international commercial air travel through the use of improved watch list matching. It also seeks to prevent delays or inconveniences at the airport, particularly for those individuals who have similar names to those on the watch lists.

What you should do: You should already be making your airline reservation using your name as it is written on the government-issued ID that you use when traveling. However, for the near future,TSA is flexible regarding small differences, such as the use of a middle initial instead of a full middle name, or no middle name/initial at all. Over time, passengers should strive to obtain consistency between the name of their ID, their travel information, and credit cards.

The TSA says that asking for date of birth and gender will help cut down on the number of false matches on the government's suspected terrorist watch list.

Win airline tickets to Denver CO or Burlington, VT

Watch the Brewers Play the Rockies from a seat in Coors Field in Denver, or relax at the Von Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe, Vermont if you are the lucky winner of one of two radio promotions airing over the next few weeks.

Brewers in Denver: Listen to Lucas & Lepay in the Morning (M-F 6-8am) or The Mike Heller show (M-F 2-6pm), both on 1070 WTSO-AM. If you qualify, you could win two tickets on American / American Eagle Airlines to Denver from Dane County Regional Airport to see the Milwaukee Brewers play the Colorado Rockies on Sept. 29, with two hotel nights also provided.

Stowe, VT: Show your Sound of Music spirit as WOLX-FM 94.9 will be sending two people to the Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe, VT, leaving from Dane County Regional Airport. The Grand Prize includes:

Four tickets to The Fireside Dinner Theatre production of The Sound of Music.
Round-trip airline tickets for two from Dane County Regional Airport to Burlington, VT, for a two-night weekend getaway at the Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe, VT, with ground transportation provided.

To win the tickets to Vermont, head on down to the Essen Haus Restaurant in Madison on Tuesday, August 25, for a fun filled night of Sound of Music karaoke. Sign up between 6:00pm and 7:30pm, then get ready to sing your heart out to your favorite Sound of Music song.

US Airways will fly non-stop from Madison to Washington, D.C.

Delta Air Lines and US Airways announced that they will exchange certain flying rights and airport facilities at New York's LaGuardia and Washington's Reagan National airports. The impact for DCRA is that the mid-day daily non-stop flight to Reagan National will be operated by US Airways rather than Delta / Northwest. The swap still needs federal government approval.

Travel agencies may save $ for business travelers

Topaz International, which provides data about the corporate travel industry, conducted a comparative study of corporate travel airfares between travel agencies and various Internet sites. For 2009 it showed that traditional travel agencies obtain a lower or equal fare over 90% of the time.

Goodyear blimp visits Madison

The Goodyear blimp was a visitor to the Dane County Regional Airport as its crew made overnight stops on the way to and from covering the PGA golf championship near Minneapolis Aug. 13-16.