Fort Smith airport traffic continues decline; trend improves

Traffic out of the Fort Smith Regional Airport continues to reflect the slowdown in the local and national economies and a June loss of a Memphis connection, with August enplanements down almost 10% compared to August 2008.

August saw 5,997 boardings out of Fort Smith, down 9.7% compared August 2008, according to figures published by the airport.

For the first eight months of the year, enplanements total 53,980 down 10% from the 60,001 in the same period of 2008. The trend, however, is improving considering that enplanements for the first six months of the year were down 11.1%

Passenger enplanements at the Fort Smith Regional Airport totaled 87,030 in 2008, down 12.2% from the 99,127 enplanements in 2007. The 2008 traffic total is the lowest at the airport in the past 10 years.

The Fort Smith Regional Airport lost in June its direct Delta connection to the Atlanta airport. The loss is a result of the acquisition of Northwest Airlines by Delta. American Eagle Airlines operates five flights a day — all connecting to Dallas-Fort Worth — out of Fort Smith. Delta/Northwest has three flights a day to Memphis.

American Eagle reported that its August boardings were 1.427 million, down 2.5% from August 2008. For the year, the regional airline reports boardings of 10.56 million, down 8.5% compared to the same period of 2008.

The Air Transport Association predicted airline travel would dip 7% between June 1 and Aug. 31, a decline of about 150,000 travelers a day. According to the May 15 ATA statement, approximately 195 million passengers are expected to fly this summer on U.S. airlines, down from 209 million during the summer months of 2008. The ATA attributed the drop in traffic to the global recession, and later updated the report to include the outbreak of swine flu as a cause in reduced airline traffic.