American Airlines begins flights from N.Y. to Cape Cod Gateway Airport, but not everyone is pleased - The Boston Globe (2024)

American will also start flights between Cape Cod and Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport later this month. One-way fares to LaGuardia start at $67, while one-way fares to D.C. start at $160. American joins JetBlue and Cape Air, which were the only airlines offering flights out of Hyannis until this week.

“There’s a lot of people who live on the Cape who utilize American Airlines regularly,” Servis said. “I lobbied and wooed many airlines for six years to come here, particularly American. And all of a sudden, one day, I received a phone call from somebody on the operations team of American Airlines, and they said, ‘We want to discuss coming to your airport.’”

In addition to the new flights from American, Servis said the airport is currently in talks with other airlines about providing winter service to Florida, something that many Cape residents have requested.

In anticipation of American Airlines’s arrival, Cape Cod Gateway purchased radio and digital ads in New York and D.C. earlier this year to promote the destination. Servis said traffic to the airport’s website has “absolutely skyrocketed.” According to the travel booking website Hopper, Hyannis is the site’s top trending domestic destination among small airports.

The routes will also provide more options for year-round residents, including those who moved to the area during the pandemic. More than 60 percent of people who bought homes on Cape Cod during the coronavirus pandemic plan to stay year-round, according to a survey by the Cape Cod Commission.

The new flights coincide with a $25 million plan to extend one of the airport’s runways by 900 feet to allow larger planes to use Gateway. Airport officials say the longer runway would accommodate the long-haul jets most airlines now fly. Currently, the largest aircraft coming into Cape Cod Gateway are the short- to medium-haul E175s and E190s. Extending the runway will also bring it up to Federal Aviation Administration standards and, in the process, potentially entice additional airlines to come to the Cape.

Not everyone celebrates the arrival of the new flights or supports the runway extension. A group of residents in Hyannis and surrounding towns have been outspoken about the longer runway, saying that the airport is underutilized and there’s no reason for the federal government to sink $25 million into a “ghost airport.”

“Less than 1 percent of our residents actually use that airport,” said Paul Phalan of Barnstable. “There are a lot more important uses for that land. Why don’t we reuse these 640 acres for better purposes? Housing would make a lot more sense.”

Phalan and other opponents of the runway point out that the airport has seen a 97 percent drop in passengers since 2007. At its height, the airport served more than 420,000 passengers annually. Last year, that number was just under 30,000.

“There are too many concerns, like the environment and noise, to spend millions of dollars on an airport nobody uses,” Phalan said.

Linda Bolliger, president of the Hyannis Park Civic Association, said that the airport generally responds to their concerns about noise levels by saying, “We’ll look into it,” and then takes no action.

“Yes, there definitely is a need for some air travel access. We absolutely need that on the Cape and the islands,” Bolliger said. “But like many things on Cape Cod, the airport started as a tiny airstrip and just evolved. There was no planning. There’s never been a comprehensive study. So we’re just saying, ‘Wait a minute, take an overview of the transportation modes.’ That way, we can determine where we can best serve the public and serve our tourists.”

Opponents have also voiced concerns over pollution at the site. The runway extension project is currently under environmental review, and organizations such as the Cape Cod Sierra Club and the Association to Preserve Cape Cod have submitted statements calling attention to previous contaminants used at the site and the potential harm to wetlands if the runway is extended.

Business owners and the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce see the additional flights as a positive for the region. Residents will have more options for flying off the Cape, and the new route will also give D.C. residents their first direct flight to the Cape.

“I feel like this could be an opportunity for us to capture some more tourism and maybe some different guests from all over the country,” said Hollie Handrahan, general manager of Red Jacket Beach Resort & Spa in Yarmouth. “We just underwent a $40 million renovation, and we’re not far from the airport. So we feel like we’re well-positioned.”

With the new flights comes a new problem: space. Cape Cod Gateway isn’t large enough to handle passengers from four flights simultaneously. The airport has one area for passengers who have undergone TSA screening, but it can hold just 138 passengers.

“If we have two American Airlines jets on the ground and JetBlue and Cape Air flights all at the same time, which will happen, we will exhaust the numbers that can fit into that screening checkpoint,” Servis said. “We’ve already had meetings with our airlines that they’re going to have to stage their passengers going through screening.”

She said staggering TSA screenings would work for this season, but very shortly, the 12-year-old airport will likely need to create a temporary structure where screened passengers can wait for their flights until a long-term solution can be found. If the airport is successful at bringing in other airlines, she said the airport will need to look at other ways to expand.

While Servis said she would love to see the airport serve as many passengers as it used to, she’s also cognizant of what the community needs.

“People love coming to Cape Cod for the quaintness of it and what it has to offer,’” she said. “And it’s very unique. You don’t need to put a Logan South here. You need something appropriate that gets people to their destinations, especially those who have moved into the area during COVID and want to live here year-round. They need a transportation option that doesn’t require them to travel for four hours to get to Logan. And that’s what we’re offering.”

Christopher Muther can be reached at christopher.muther@globe.com. Follow him @Chris_Muther and Instagram @chris_muther.