Southwest, ATA to connect at McCarran

Tuesday, June 28, 2005 | 10:56 a.m.

Southwest Airlines, the busiest airline at McCarran International Airport, is likely to get a little busier in August when it expands its code-share agreement with ATA Airlines and begins offering connecting service to Honolulu through Las Vegas.

While Southwest and ATA will benefit from the arrangement, McCarran officials aren't thrilled with the plan because there will be increased traffic at the airport, but minimal positive impact on the local economy.

"We're not really high on connecting passengers since we have a limited capacity here at McCarran," said Randy Walker, director of the Clark County Department of Aviation, which oversees McCarran. "Our principal goal is to bring people into the airport to go to conventions and participate in our tourism economy. It (the code-share expansion) might help the airport, but it doesn't help the community as a whole."

Under a plan announced by Southwest and ATA this morning, Southwest will offer connecting flights to Honolulu via ATA from 11 cities -- Albany, N.Y.; Amarillo and San Antonio, Texas; Hartford, Conn.; Kansas City; West Palm Beach, Fla.; Phoenix and Tucson, Ariz.; Reno; Seattle; and Tulsa, Okla. The airlines will begin the new connecting service Aug. 4 and have already begun selling tickets.

Under code-share agreements, passengers can transfer seamlessly from one airline to the other and have their baggage transferred on one ticket.

Walker said today that ATA, which has been housed at Terminal 2 because it started out primarily as a charter airline, would move to Terminal 1's C gates from which Southwest flights arrive and depart. Southwest, which has made a case for more gates at McCarran to handle the airline's growth, was able to accommodate ATA's schedule in the C gates, just as it has worked with Aloha Airlines to allow space for its minimal schedule.

While Southwest officials said passengers transferring between Southwest and ATA flights would likely buy products from airport retailers, Walker said he's never been very positive about any carrier that uses McCarran as a transfer point.

"I can't stop it or ban it and can't keep airlines from doing it, but our primary function is to accommodate passengers who are here to enjoy our tourism facilities," Walker said.

Tempe, Ariz.-based America West Airlines uses McCarran as a secondary hub for its cross-country flights, especially at night, and as Southwest grows, it is using Las Vegas as a transfer point for more of its own operations.

Walker has said McCarran is the No. 2 origination and destination airport in the nation because such a high percentage of passengers come here for conventions and vacations.

In a separate announcement today, Walker said that the airport is expanding its SpeedCheck electronic check-in service at the airport with a special counter that will allow passengers of America West and Delta to print their own baggage tags when they get their boarding passes.

The two-step process enables passengers of those airlines to avoid lengthy ticket counter lines. There are 32 stand-alone computer kiosks located throughout the airport's two terminals and plans are under way to add 100 more.

Walker said eventually all airlines on the SpeedCheck system would be enabled to print baggage tags. The airport was the first in the nation to offer common-use kiosks to serve several airlines. By next summer, Walker said he hopes to replace each airline's proprietary kiosks with the SpeedCheck units.