Site Admin

Joined: 15 Jun 2005
Posts: 2316
Location: Indianapolis, IN

For the first time in years IND has a new #1 airline. Southwest Airlines in March 2009 passed Northwest airlines with a market share of 18.9% beating out Northwest Airlines which managed an 18.5% share. This of course will change again when Northwest Airlines and Delta Airlines traffic numbers are combined. Not sure when that will happen. This really doesn't come as a total shock. I was at the airport one morning really early and there was a huge crowd of people at the Southwest ticket counter.

Source: http://www.indianapolisairport...31.09AirlineActivityReport.pdf

Additional notes on the traffic stats. March 2009 is down 7.2% over March of 2008. So far 2009 traffic is missing the Indianapolis Airport Authority traffic forecast by a wide margin. For whatever reason they forecast more traffic in 2009 over 2008. There is no chance of that happening. Given the state of the economy, the NW/DL merger and the move to smaller jets at IND the year 2009 will likely fall well below 2008. We will not hit 8 million passengers served this year. In fact I am predicting 7.75 million passengers served for 2009. Look for 2010 to be a big rebound year.

Site Admin

Joined: 15 Jun 2005
Posts: 2316
Location: Indianapolis, IN

In April 2009 the lead for Southwest Airlines grew. They reported an 18.8% market share while Northwest Airlines dropped to 16.1%. AirTran Airways came in 3rd at 14.6%. Traffic at IND is down 9.6% for April 2009 over April 2008. At the current pace the 2009 traffic is on pace to finish below 7.2 million passengers served which is just horrible. The busy months are still to come so that number will move up. Traffic will have to meet the forecast every month until the end of the year just to reach the 8 million passenger mark. Given how poorly traffic has performed this year it seems highly unlikely. Who knows. My forecast of 7.75 million passengers might be optimistic. But I am sticking with it.

Source: http://www.indianapolisairport...%20Report%20-%20April%2009.pdf

Member

Joined: 11 Oct 2006
Posts: 248
Location: Lexington ky

since Swa has the largest market share would they add more flights or more 1 stop flights to popular destionations?

Site Admin

Joined: 15 Jun 2005
Posts: 2316
Location: Indianapolis, IN

Seems they are cutting back service. They cut JAX. They are also cutting LAS to 2x daily. They have cut or will cut MCO down to 1x daily. LAS is a shock to me. I checked fairmeasure.com and over 1000 people a day fly to LAS from here. And now that will only have 2 daily nonstops on it?

Site Admin

Joined: 15 Jun 2005
Posts: 2316
Location: Indianapolis, IN

Last year I made a forecast of 7.75 million passengers served for the Indianapolis International Airport. I said I was being optimistic but I was sticking with that number. The airport authority had a forecast of approximately 8.25 million passengers to be served. The numbers are in for 2009 and the airport handled 7,465,719. While I wasn't as close as I was the year before I still beat the experts by a mile.

Member

Joined: 17 Feb 2010
Posts: 8
Location:

I was such a fan of IND being a Northwest focus city! I hope that Delta makes a large presence at IND now. But the problem is that it is so close to CVG. Southwest is still a great airline.