Tampa International airport is the co-host of Network 2007, the premier route-planning event for the Americas. Its executive director Louis Miller tells Mark Pilling how he wants carriers to get in touch with the airport and the Tampa Bay region at Network

 

A broad customer base, a strong home market and growth potential are three sound business requirements for any company. Tampa International airport has all three.

Situated on the west coast of Florida, the region around the state’s third largest city, after Jacksonville and Miami, is a popular leisure and tourist destination. Tampa International has capitalised on this popularity without the benefit of having a home base carrier to underpin its operation. “Over 90% of our customers are origin and destination traffic, we are not a connecting hub,” says Louis Miller, who marks a decade at the helm of the airport this year.

The airport has non-stop service to some 70 North American cities and counts virtually every US legacy and low-fare carrier among its customer base, says Miller. “The spread of carriers that we have is one of the keys to our success. The airport has about the fifth-lowest average airfare in the US because we have so much competition.”

Southwest Airlines is the largest operator at Tampa with about 25% of the traffic serving 29 cities. Its latest service to the city is from Washington Dulles, which Southwest is entering following the closure of Independence Air. Twice-daily flights were launched in early October.

 

Continental’s Latin connection

The strategy behind Continental’s huge network expansion into Latin America and the Caribbean, and particularly Mexico, will be a talking point at the Network 2007 conference with the airline’s staff vice-president for the region, Pete Garcia, confirmed as the latest speaker at the event.

Continental now serves over 75 destinations in Latin America and the Caribbean.

 

However, this year has not been about unfettered growth for Tampa, particularly with the bankruptcy filings of Delta and Northwest Airlines, which have caused some cutbacks. “A lot of Florida has seen a vast reduction in service,” says Miller. Tampa has been hit, but not too badly as other carriers picked up routes and added their own new service. “This year will be kind of flat whereas I expect 3-5% growth in 2007,” says Miller. Tampa will handle around 19.5 million passengers this year.

The strength of the Tampa Bay area continues to drive domestic traffic to the airport. Tampa’s commercial team is also pushing hard to win more international service. Not being a hub puts Tampa at a disadvantage in this respect, as the US majors will not launch European or Latin routes from the airport, says Miller.

So Tampa concentrates on wooing Canadian and European players. Canada’s WestJet has come in with new seasonal service to Tampa from Montreal and Ottawa, and it will add Halifax next March.

One of the airport’s highest priorities is to persuade British Airways to up its five-times weekly service to daily to better serve business travellers, says Miller. Tampa is also working hard to win service from Lufthansa and is looking to tempt some Latin carriers to begin service. The airport is focusing on scheduled carriers, with Network co-host and neighbouring airport St Petersburg-Clearwater seen as a better fit for charter and leisure carriers.

“It’s a very long game,” says Miller of the challenge of attracting international service. “Sometimes it is hard for the community to understand that.”

Bringing Network to Tampa Bay is addressing that challenge. It gives key decision-makers the chance to “touch and feel” what the airports are all about, says Miller. “It helps a lot when they go back and start to make their ultimate decisions,” he says. “It’s a great opportunity to tell our story.”

Tampa invests

After spending $650 million on capital improvements over the past eight years, Tampa International is planning to invest a further $1 billion at the airport over the coming decade, says Louis Miller.

The bulk of the money will go towards its new North Terminal complex. With an opening date set for October 2015, this terminal will add 14 gates to the airport in its first phase. The ultimate build-out will see 50 gates at the terminal. Today Tampa has 59 gates across four concourses. A fourth runway could also be in operation by 2018-20. 

  

Network 2007

To book a place at Network or for further information on attending, just visit the website.

Dates 4-6 March

Venue Tampa Bay, Florida

Host Tampa and St Petersburg-Clearwater international airports

Event organiser Airline Business

Conference manager Lucy Flint

Website

Source: Airline Business

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