Rockford airport officials: Good thing we weren’t part of JetAmerica fiasco

2 comments July 22nd, 2009

Chicago Rockford International Airport had a chance to be part of JetAmerica’s rollout, but were asked to provide marketing and/or revenue guarantee money up front, airport Executive Director Bob O’Brien just confirmed. The airport said no, thanks. (Toledo, on the other hand, paid for a $150,000 “learning experience” and other airports lost a bit less for an airline that never got off the ground.)

“Clearly we made the right decision and we’re not as badly bruised as Lansing and Toledo,” O’Brien said. “On the other side of the coin, I take no pleasure in being right and getting nothing. … I just wish that we could have been in the rollout and they could have rolled out.”

O’Brien is not ready to throw the JetAmerica folks under the bus, as they’ll be back in some form or another. JetAmerica is already saying as much: “We have decided to suspend our operations in order to refocus on different markets. We still strongly believe that there is an unmet need for affordable air service to secondary markets and we look forward to offering this option again in the near future,” CEO John Weikle said.

If they come back looking to fly out of RFD, O’Brien will listen, though not if they’re asking for a lot of money again

“It totally depends on what they came back with, in terms of destinations, in terms of aircraft, in terms of fare structure,” O’Brien said. “There’s no blank checks. We’re interested, but it has to make sense.”