Skip to main content

FT masthead

Written by Forward Thinking.

To Get International Flights Will Take State and Local Incentives

aTata et al

It’s long been asked in these parts: how can you have an international airport but no passenger flights to international destinations?

It’s a good question, and in a presentation to the Hampton Roads Transportation Planning Organization (HRTPO) in May, Norfolk “International” Airport President/CEO Mark Perryman offered an explanation and road map for flights to say London, Paris, Rome, Amsterdam, Cancun and Punta Cana. “We have a better shot working with carriers outside the US such as Aer Lingus than domestic ones like Delta and United who already have American hubs, but it takes money.”

He noted that Missouri budgeted $5 million to lure trans-Atlantic flights to St. Louis and/or Kansas City, the largest airports in the country (we’re #7) with no such destinations. British Airways brought service to Cincinnati thanks to $700,000 in airport marketing support plus $10 million in revenue guarantees from JobsOhio. Providence packaged $3 million in waivers and another $3 million in tax credits. San Antonio secured $2 million in corporate funding through its CVB to attract Condor service from Frankfurt.

Around the table this day were reps from every local county and city (including airport hosts Norfolk and Virginia Beach) as well as the General Assembly. As it stands, our legislature has pledged $825,000 in a new Governor’s Airline Incentive Fund, but Perryman said local governments, businesses, development agencies and the Norfolk Airport Authority will need to pony up too and keep the money in their budgets going forward. What we can do as consumers is not drive to Dulles to catch a foreign flight. Start your journey here, says Perryman. “Otherwise it weakens our figures and argument for local service.”

In anticipation of more traffic to Portugal or Peru, Norfolk International is constructing an international arrivals facility, set to open in January, and Skytrax just rated our airport the fourth best domestic one in the world, behind a pair in Japan and one in China, mainly because of ORF’s “efficient passenger movement and processing system.” And this was before our long dormant moving walkways reopened last month.

Keep up the good work Mark.