It seems to Porky MKE has much more limited service and has become significantly more expensive to fly into in recent years. Not that Porky travels there often, but when Porky does, flight options seem more limited and more expensive with each passing year. Porky was very excited when Jet Blue announced it's inaugural JFK-MKE service a couple of years ago since they were the only non-regional jet option into MKE from the NYC area at the time, but that route only lasted 1.5 years. Oddly Jet Blue kept their Boston-MKE route despite Boston having 1/5 the population of greater NYC. American's regional affiliate recently cut their 3x daily non-stop LGA-MKE route so now Delta Connection is the only non-stop option from LGA. United Exp does still fly to MKE 2x daily from EWR, but who knows how long that will last given EWR's issues. Being so close to ORD, does MKE suffer from what New Englanders refer to as Providence and Hartford syndrome? Hartford is equi-distant from NYC and Boston and Providence is only an hour from Boston so they both tend to get screwed on air service. It's going to cost Porky a small fortune to come out for Porky Jr's freshman orientation in August. Sure we could fly into ORD, but by the time we rent a car, pay for hotel parking etc. we'll only be saving a couple hundred bucks as rental-car prices are insane too. Thoughts?
Air Tran's acquisition by Southwest 15ish years ago was a big hit for MKE, among other factors. Had 30-40 daily flights out, a very good frequent flier program, and was the only notable airline that had a hub there at that point. After acquisition, Southwest just made MKE another smaller regional airport.
United and American both have a hub 90 miles away at ORD. MKE is right between 2 Delta hubs. It's just not a great spot with the consolidation that gobbled up most regional airlines.
The United EWR route won't be going anywhere. They already cut it down from 4 flights a day, 2 is probably the floor. That's probably your best bet, fares aren't terrible if you book a few months in advance.
As an alternate, you can try Avelo Airlines from New Haven to Chicago instead of NYC to Chicago. You should even find better pricing.
My wife's friend had used to fly to Chicago in the past and my daughter uses for cheap flights to Puerto Rico and Florida.
Would you save any money by taking the Coach bus from ORD to Milwaukee? That would eliminate rental car and hotel parking fees. Just throwing it out there.
Midwest being bought out by Republic and merged with Frontier, along with Frontier's subsequent devolution into Spirit Airlines II and the elimination of MKE as a hub, really hurt, and MKE has really never recovered from that. The ORD hubs have been mentioned, but you also have Delta hubs in Detroit and MSP, relegating Milwaukee to regional flights.
When Southwest first bought AirTran, there were a ton of Southwest flights directly out of MKE all over the place. But gradually those dwindled down.
Quote from: Billy Hoyle on June 18, 2025, 08:38:45 AMMidwest being bought out by Republic and merged with Frontier, along with Frontier's subsequent devolution into Spirit Airlines II and the elimination of MKE as a hub, really hurt, and MKE has really never recovered from that. The ORD hubs have been mentioned, but you also have Delta hubs in Detroit and MSP, relegating Milwaukee to regional flights.
The best airline I ever flew. All seats were first class. They had 3 choices for breakfast on their morning flights and their chocolate chip cookies were out of this world. You could have a steak or brats with a cold brew on their afternoon flights. Go ahead and laugh but they were the good old days and sadly I don't think they will ever see them return.
Quote from: muwarrior69 on June 18, 2025, 09:30:46 AMThe best airline I ever flew. All seats were first class. They had 3 choices for breakfast on their morning flights and their chocolate chip cookies were out of this world. You could have a steak or brats with a cold brew on their afternoon flights. Go ahead and laugh but they were the good old days and sadly I don't think will ever see them return.
They won't. Because people aren't willing to pay for it.
Quote from: The Sultan on June 18, 2025, 09:32:02 AMThey won't. Because people aren't willing to pay for it.
Some are (or their employers are), so they do - they sit in First Class or Business Class.
But your point is right. Generally speaking, people like their cheap coach tickets so much that they're willing to sacrifice airplane meals, free checked luggage and even comfortable seats to get those cheap tickets.
Prices go up, services/quality go down.
Tale as old as time.
Milwaukee is an airline backwater. As a spoke, it's way too close to Chicago, Minneapolis and Detroit (less than one hour's flying time from all three) to have strong, lower-cost service.
There are 3 hubs (AA, UA and SW) within 100 miles, so the lift won't be there to allow for any significant lower airfares.
Milwaukee will never be an airline hub again because there simply isn't enough corporate headquarters in the area to support one. As best I can tell, there are three of material size -- NML, Baird and FiServ. Midwest Express was nice (though I didn't "get it" when compared to comparable first class airline service) but as others have said, few are willing to pay the premium prices demanded to make Midwest Express V2.0 work. That's what killed it the first time.
Quote from: dgies9156 on June 19, 2025, 01:53:46 PMMilwaukee is an airline backwater. As a spoke, it's way too close to Chicago, Minneapolis and Detroit (less than one hour's flying time from all three) to have strong, lower-cost service.
There are 3 hubs (AA, UA and SW) within 100 miles, so the lift won't be there to allow for any significant lower airfares.
Milwaukee will never be an airline hub again because there simply isn't enough corporate headquarters in the area to support one. As best I can tell, there are three of material size -- NML, Baird and FiServ. Midwest Express was nice (though I didn't "get it" when compared to comparable first class airline service) but as others have said, few are willing to pay the premium prices demanded to make Midwest Express V2.0 work. That's what killed it the first time.
Poor people fly commercial. Who cares?