Alaska Airlines announced today seven new routes from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) to further connect its guests between Southern California and key markets around the country, including the first nonstop service from the West Coast to Fort Myers/Naples, Fla. (RSW) from both LAX and Seattle.
The added service builds on five recent additional routes that link LAX to cities across the West for a total of 12 new routes this year. Alaska will fly to 35 nonstop destinations from LAX this winter with a strong platform for future growth. Tickets for all flights are available for purchase at alaskaair.com with fares starting as low as $39 one way.
The new routes will connect Alaska’s guests in Southern California to destinations in Florida (Fort Myers and Tampa); Hawaii (Kona and Lihue); Montana (Bozeman) and Oregon (Eugene and Medford). Service starts on Oct. 1 for the Oregon markets, and between Nov. 20 and December 18 for the remaining destinations.
“LAX is one of Alaska’s important hub markets and continues to offer valuable opportunities for selective expansion,” said Brett Catlin, Alaska Airlines managing director of capacity planning and alliances. “The addition of these 12 new routes from LAX along with our upcoming membership in the oneworld alliance sets the stage for future growth.”
New Service from Seattle, Portland and San Diego
Alaska will also start new service in November from additional West Coast airports: Seattle–Fort Myers; Portland–Fort Lauderdale; and San Diego–Fort Lauderdale. The added service to Fort Lauderdale complements Alaska’s existing nonstop service to Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles. Alaska will operate 14 routes between the West Coast and Florida this coming winter.
Final Thoughts
When other airlines are leaving cities, he is an example of an airline adding new cities to their route structure. It looks like Alaska Airlines is doing two things here:
- Building their LAX operations by bringing more traffic to Los Angeles as a destination and connection city,
- Building the leisure market out of Los Angeles especially to Hawaii and Florida.
The new service to Fort Myers and Tampa Florida adds capacity to the west coast of Florida as gateway airports to the Florida gulf islands of Sanibel, Captiva and Marco Islands.
