LOOKING IN ON: TOURISM

Monday, April 2, 2007 | 7:10 a.m.

When NASA astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon in a spacecraft dubbed the Eagle, television pictures were broadcast to millions of people watching on Earth.

When 77-year-old Aldrin buzzed in to Eagle Point at Grand Canyon West, where the Hualapai Indian tribe has built the $30 million Skywalk attraction, the media recorded his first steps on the glass walkway that offers a view of the canyon floor, 4,000 feet down. Straight down.

When the media were invited onto the glass bridge, tribal officials announced that it would be the last time cameras would be allowed on the Skywalk.

What?

Concerned that careless guests would drop their cameras onto the floor and chip the glass, the tribe is banning cameras and other carry-ons on the Skywalk.

But for a Kodak moment, the tribe will have four cameras mounted along the canyon rim to snap your picture when you're on the Skywalk - and sell it to you.

Tour vendors attending Aldrin's walk over the edge publicly applauded the engineering feat, but privately wondered who would shell out more than $50 per person to go on the Skywalk.

Walking on the Skywalk is a tour add-on, priced at $25, but the cheapest tour base price goes for $28.95.

Getting to Grand Canyon West is also an adventure, with 14 miles of the 120-mile journey from Las Vegas along unpaved Diamond Bar Road, a bone-rattling experience best suited to off-road vehicles.

The U.S. Department of Transportation's preliminary approval for Virgin America to begin operations started a chain reaction that is expected to result in lower airfares between Las Vegas and the San Francisco Bay Area.

The carrier will inaugurate service with flights between San Francisco and New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport and will quickly add Las Vegas, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles and San Diego to the mix.

Virgin America touts itself as a low-cost carrier with frills that include large, seat-back television screens and self-serve mini-bars.

The arrival of Virgin America is expected to put a competitive dent in United Airlines' Ted operation and US Airways, the two carriers that handle the most passengers between Las Vegas and San Francisco.

Another competitive wrinkle emerged in February, when Southwest Airlines announced plans to return to San Francisco by fall.

Southwest, the busiest carrier at McCarran, promised not to remove flights to Oakland and San Jose when it goes into San Francisco International Airport.

Let's see whether Southwest triggers a fare battle between Las Vegas and San Francisco, which happened when Southwest began operating in Philadelphia and Denver in 2004 and 2006.

When US Airways announced plans to bid for a route between the United States and China this year, there was a glimmer of hope for Nevada that the state's marketing efforts there would pay off and that Las Vegas would finally get the nonstop flights it wants from that country.

But instead, executives of the Tempe, Ariz.-based airline, which operates a hub at McCarran International Airport, said they would bid for flights linking Shanghai with Philadelphia.

According to US Airways President Scott Kirby, the analysis wasn't even close.

Philadelphia, the second-largest city on the East Coast and the largest metropolitan area without nonstop service to Asia, is US Airways' primary international gateway.

Because US Airways isn't a household name in China, the airline felt it had a better chance of filling flights with business people from Philadelphia going to China than tourists coming to Las Vegas from Shanghai.

US Airways may have a bigger hurdle to clear than filling seats when it competes with other carriers for a new China route.

If US Airways wins the route, the airline will have to get an aircraft with sufficient range to make the flight.