LV airline capacity numbers stagnant

Thursday, July 5, 2001 | 10:53 a.m.

The number of flights and available airline seats coming into McCarran International Airport remained flat from May to June.

That means passenger counts -- and gaming revenue -- could be weak for the month, a gaming analyst says.

Robin Farley, an analyst for UBS Warburg, acknowledged that passenger counts were up 3.7 percent in May, the third consecutive month in which airline seat capacity to Las Vegas had fallen. But she warned that capacity weakness in June is an indicator that passenger counts could drop.

Passenger counts for June will be reported later this month and gaming win statistics for June will be reported in August.

"Over the past year, overall visitation has lagged airline traffic by about five percentage points, so we would not be surprised to see a decline in overall visitation for June," Farley said in a recent report. "We could see continued airline passenger traffic weakness given that airline seat capacity, which is typically reported about a month ahead of passengers, has declined from the prior year in each of the last three months, including June."

From May to June, the number of flights departing from Las Vegas increased by one -- from about 438 operations a day to 439. Also, capacity climbed by 70 passengers, to 64,017.

No single air carrier had any major increases or decreases for the month, as the 32 airlines offering scheduled service to Las Vegas continued their pattern of juggling aircraft fleets to meet demand to the city.

The biggest increase came from Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines, which brought back two of the flights it had canceled earlier in the year -- nonstop round trips to and from Atlanta and Cincinnati. Delta now has 23 flights a day, including six to Atlanta and four to Cincinnati.

Denver-based Frontier Airlines dropped one of its daily flights between Las Vegas and Denver and modified one flight a week on another. Frontier now has two daily flights and another that operates six times a week to Denver.

Other carriers cutting service to Las Vegas -- most of them one or two flights a week -- were American, Alaska, Continental and United. Adding a handful of weekly flights were America West, American Trans Air, Northwest and Mexicana.

The biggest increase among carriers adding weekly flights was the heavily promoted addition of a flight between Las Vegas and London offered by Virgin Atlantic Airlines. Virgin Atlantic now has three flights a week between McCarran and London's Gatwick International Airport.

Southwest Airlines, the busiest carrier at McCarran, was the busiest in June at modifying its schedule, but the net result was that the airline still has about 163 daily flights.

The airline added a weekly nonstop flight to Raleigh, N.C., but ended weekly flights to and from St. Louis and Tampa, Fla. Southwest also made minor additions in flights to Albuquerque, N.M.; Burbank, Calif.; Oakland, Calif.; Oklahoma City; Phoenix; Reno; Salt Lake City; San Diego; San Jose, Calif.; and Tucson, Ariz.

The company also cut service to Kansas City, Mo.; Los Angeles; Sacramento, Calif.; San Antonio, Texas; and Seattle.

America West Airlines, the No. 2 carrier at McCarran, restored its daily service between Las Vegas and Reno, increasing flights that had operated three times a week. America West also added weekly flights to Phoenix, Los Angeles and Sacramento.

Las Vegas-based National Airlines, operating under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, also tinkered with its schedule, going from six trips a week to daily service on one of its three flights to Chicago's Midway Airport. National dropped one flight a week from the five daily trips to and from New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport.