Columbus airports have expanded nonstop flight destinations, expect record summer travel
Columbus’ two airports are anticipating a record summer for air travel, and you can be part of it by flying directly to The Big Apple, The Big Easy, The Windy City or Sin City.
You can also now visit — without a layover — what has been called the "Live Music Capital of the World" (Austin, Texas) and the "Smithsonian of the South" (Raleigh, North Carolina).
John Glenn Columbus International Airport and Rickenbacker International Airport have expanded their nonstop flight offerings in the last two years, and have hit a milestone of 50 nonstop destinations across North America.
Here are the recently added nonstop flight offerings (all leave from John Glenn):
Raleigh and Durham, North Carolina via Breeze Airways
Orange County, California via Breeze Airways (seasonal)
Providence, Rhode Island via Breeze Airways
Austin, Texas via Southwest
The Columbus Regional Airport Authority, which operates the John Glenn and Rickenbacker airports, is anticipating summer air travel volumes this year to fully rebound from pandemic levels and surpass the record-breaking season in 2019.
The authority is projecting around 1 million scheduled departing airline seats between June 1 and July 31. That’s compared to 996,000 seats during the same time period in 2019.
“We’ve seen nearly all our routes return that were lost during the pandemic,” said Betsy Taylor, manager of passenger airline business development for the airport authority. “This summer is expected to be busy, with airlines flying larger aircraft into our region.”
Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, about half of the passengers flying out of Columbus were traveling for leisure, according to the authority.
At the beginning of 2022, Taylor said that leisure travelers had become the clear majority, and the authority responded by adding more flights to popular vacation spots — like nonstop flights to Miami or Cancun, Mexico.
“Leisure travel is still strong, but business travel has been returning,” Taylor told The Dispatch earlier this month. “Work travel is looking a bit different these days, with some passengers purposefully looking to extend their business travel into a leisure trip. The industry has been referring to this as ‘bleisure’ travel.”
Here are some sunny destinations you can fly to directly from Columbus airports this summer (some are seasonal, but all are offered in July 2023):
Atlanta via Delta or Southwest
Cancun via American, Southwest or Vacation Express
Charleston, South Carolina via Allegiant or Breeze
Charlotte, North Carolina via American
Dallas and Fort Worth, Texas via American or Southwest
Fort Lauderdale, Florida via Allegiant, Southwest or Spirit
Houston via Southwest or United
Jacksonville, Florida via Breeze
Las Vegas via Southwest or Spirit
Los Angeles via Spirit
Miami via American
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina via Allegiant or Southwest
Nashville via Southwest
New Orleans via Breeze or Spirit
Orlando, Florida via Allegiant, Frontier, Southwest or Spirit
Phoenix via American or Southwest
San Francisco via United
Tampa, Florida via Allegiant or Southwest
The airport authority keeps an updated list of nonstop flights.
If you’re willing to drive to Cincinnati Northern Kentucky International Airport (the cheapest parking lot is $9 per day), that airport boasts more than 50 nonstop destinations, including some Columbus isn't connected to directly.
A few of those destinations with warm weather include Punta Cana, Dominican Republic; Los Cabos, Mexico; Savannah, Georgia; and some Florida destinations like Fort Myers and Key West. You can also reach London directly from Cincinnati via British Airways.
More: Traveling this summer is going to be expensive, but Ohioans still plan to do a lot of it
jlaird@dispatch.com
@LairdWrites
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Warm vacation spots you can fly nonstop to from Columbus this summer
