- Frontier Airlines is leaving Newark Liberty International Airport and Washington Dulles International Airport.
- The airline will end service to the two cities indefinitely in Q1 2022, citing high airport costs as the reason.
- Frontier's cited high-costs stem from the major redevelopment project going on at Newark Liberty.
Frontier Airlines is ending service to two major cities on the East Coast in the first quarter of 2022, the company said in its Q3 earnings call this month.
It will leave Newark Liberty International Airport and Dulles International Airport in Washington DC by March 2022, citing high airport costs. The airline entered New Jersey's largest airport just two years ago, shortly after Southwest Airlines' exit, and expanded its routes to leisure markets across the US and the Caribbean The move comes after Frontier left Los Angeles and San Jose in California earlier this year.
"We're taking action on the significant increase we're seeing in the cost pressures at airports," Frontier senior vice president of commercial Daniel Shurz said in the earnings call. "As with any airport, if the fare and cost relationship improves, we will revisit the decision."
According to Frontier's website, the last flight available out of Dulles is January 4. Meanwhile, the airline did not give an exact date on which it is ending its Newark operation, though Shurz said in the call that service to both cities would end in Q1 2022. According to Cirium data, Frontier is scheduled to operate 10 routes from Newark and just one route from Washington Dulles to Orlando this holiday season.
In the call, Shurz reassured that despite dropping Newark and Washington Dulles, the carrier has other options for its operations
"We have so many growth opportunities, as we said multiple times this year," Shurz said. "We have lots of places to put our aircraft and so we're finding more cost-effective places in the short term."
Shurz also explained that cities like Newark, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, and San Jose have several other airport options to choose from that are more cost-effective.
Frontier's departure leaves several slots open for other carriers like United Airlines, Spirit Airlines, and JetBlue Airways to snatch up. According to data from Flight Connections, United Airlines operates 155 routes from Newark, while JetBlue operates 39 and Spirit operates 13.
Frontier is the latest airline to shake up its route network, following United Airlines, which plans to leave 11 cities due to "changes in the long-term sustainability." United cited low demand and profitability for its departure from the small communities.
