JetBlue spurns Long Beach to grow at LAX in West Coast shift

Bloomberg

JetBlue Airways Corp will make Los Angeles International its primary base in Southern California, abandoning Long Beach Airport after years of tension.
Daily flights will double to 70 by 2025 as part of a five-year expansion plan at Los Angeles International, or LAX, the airline said in a statement. The carrier will add domestic and international flights as it competes for a bigger share of the busy Los Angeles market.
JetBlue will be expanding in a highly competitive airport, where each of the four largest US carriers holds at least a 15% share of passengers. The airline will leave behind a troubled relationship with Long Beach, where city officials blocked the carrier’s plans to add international flights in 2018 and imposed fines for flights that violated a local 10 pm noise curfew. Contentious talks between the two sides delayed construction of a $45 million terminal.
“The transition to LAX, serving as the anchor of our focus city strategy on the West Coast, sets JetBlue up for success in Southern California,” Scott Laurence, head of revenue and planning, said in the statement. “We continue to seize on opportunities to emerge from this pandemic a stronger competitive force in the industry.”
The airline said in June that it would add 30 domestic routes in coming months, even as the coronavirus crisis quashes travel demand. The routes will be concentrated in the New York area while also including Florida and Philadelphia, as JetBlue bets on a quicker recovery than it originally expected. The carrier’s last flights from Long Beach, which is about 22 miles southeast of LAX, are set for October 6. Service to Portland, Oregon, will end instead of transitioning to LAX.
“We understand that the aviation industry — now more than ever — is constantly changing, and airlines nationwide are making difficult
business decisions to stay competitive in light of the pandemic,” Cynthia Guidry, Long Beach Airport director, said.