NEW HAVEN — Tweed New Haven Regional Airport is hard at work getting ready for the Dec. 10 start of Breeze Airways service, which will make it the first time in 17 years that Tweed is served by more than one airline, officials said.
Preparations for Breeze include both organizational coordination and some physical improvements, airport officials said. Tweed is already served by fellow low-cost carrier Avelo Airlines.
"Most of it just comes down to layering of the schedule so you're not landing three planes and two airlines at one time," Avports spokesman Andrew King said.
While Tweed gears up to accommodate Breeze —which already serves Connecticut flyers out of Bradley International Airport in Windsor Locks — Breeze is about to make a statement to the southern Connecticut market Tweed serves that it is open for business.
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It plans to offer $29 fares on eight routes to and from New Haven in conjunction with Black Friday, a Breeze spokesman said. The deal also includes five Hartford routes.
"We know that travelers in Connecticut want an elevated product offering that allows them to choose the experience that best fits their needs," said David Neeleman, Breeze Airways’ founder and CEO. "We’re pleased to bring more travel options to Tweed and look forward to the launch of Breeze service on December 10.”
Breeze will offer weekly nonstop flights to various Florida locations. Fort Myers starts Dec. 10, followed by Orlando and West Palm Beach on Dec. 11 and Vero Beach starting Dec. 13.
Breeze, based in Salt Lake City, Utah, will also add nonstop service to six additional destinations in February, including Charleston, S.C.; Jacksonville, Fla.; Norfolk, Va.; Raleigh-Durham, N.C., Richmond, Va., and Sarasota-Bradenton, Fla., the company previously announced.
The $29 fares will be on sale Nov. 29 through Dec. 1. Tickets are for travel from Dec. 4 through May 13, 2025, with blackouts Dec. 20-Jan. 5, Feb. 14-Feb. 25 and March 10-April 20, said Breeze spokesman Gareth Edmonson-Jones.
The Tweed routes include Fort Myers, Jacksonville, Orlando, Sarasota-Bradenton, West Palm Beach, Raleigh Durham, Norfolk and Richmond. They'll be offered from Bradley on flights to and from Daytona Beach, Jacksonville, Savannah, Coastal Carolina/New Bern, N.C. and Wilmington, N.C., he said.
A formal announcement is expected Monday, he said.
In the meantime, the two airlines and Tweed officials met Nov. 10 so the airlines could coordinate, said Jeremy Nielson, airport manager for Tweed's operator, Goldman Sachs-owned Avports LLC.
"We are scheduled to have a full-scale exercise on Dec. 4 ... just to see if there's anything that needs to be tweaked (or) any concerns that might pop up before opening day," Nielson told the Tweed New Haven Airport Authority at its regular monthly meeting.
In recent weeks, Tweed also has made a number of physical improvements, including doubling the capacity of the bathrooms in the arrivals section of Tweed's terminal and building a new bridge from which to manage all terminal and ramp operations, said Nielson.
It also built a new baggage claim office, resurfaced the terminal ramp where airlines park their airplanes and installed 1,700 feet of new fencing at the airport, Nielson said.
The airport also hired a new terminal manager and eight ramp controllers, he said.
Tweed recently opened a new bar and restaurant on the second floor of the terminal, called The Grazing Goat, Nielson said.
The last time Tweed had more than one airline providing air service was in 2007, when Pan Am Clipper Connection, operated by Boston-Maine Airways, offered nonstop flights to Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport, Hanscom Field and Pease International Airport for just over four months.
That was in addition to service by what then was US Airways Express, which in 2015 became American Eagle following the American Airlines-US Airways merger.
Breeze will begin its service as a battle over Tweed's future expansion continues to rage.
Save the Sound and East Haven are appealing the Federal Aviation Administration's "finding of no significant impact" in Tweed's proposed expansion. The project would include lengthening the runway and building a new terminal on the east side of the airport, with access from East Haven.
This month, Save the Sound filed a brief jointly with East Haven in the case.
"The Federal Aviation Administration has failed to meaningfully analyze and mitigate significant impacts of the proposed expansion, despite the fact that the airport is located in a floodplain, in a residential neighborhood, and in a state-designated environmental justice area," Jessica Roberts, staff attorney for Save the Sound, said in a release.
Save the Sound and East Haven argue the FAA's final draft environmental assessment had flaws previously pointed out by federal and state agencies and "improperly concluded that the expansion of the airport would have no significant environmental impacts," Roberts wrote in the release.
"In our brief, we argued that the Final EA failed to consider the actual number of passengers that this expansion would bring to Tweed," Roberts wrote. "While public statements and certain parts of the EA stated that it would attract additional airlines and passengers, the EA concluded that the number of passengers would remain constant, and flights would decrease."
The brief also called out that the EA didn't include an analysis of the taxiway that has to be built but would require filling tidal wetlands, she wrote.
"We also argued that the FAA further failed to meaningfully analyze localized flooding, stormwater pollution, and wetlands impacts, despite numerous calls from experts asking them to do so," Roberts wrote. "The Final EA was vague and inadequate in its discussion of stormwater and wetland impacts."
Save the Sound and East Haven are demanding the court require the FAA to do a more comprehensive and detailed environmental impact statement, including the needed mitigation measures.
"Rising sea levels and intensifying storms put residents of surrounding neighborhoods in harm’s way, necessitating a meaningful analysis of these factors under applicable law," she wrote.