Schedule drops 11 cities September 8

Milwaukee-based Midwest Airlines, which announced earlier that it will retire all 12 MD-80s from its fleet, has issued revised schedules effective September 8, when the carrier and its regional partner will stop flying to 11 cities. Midwest Airlines will eliminate service to Ft. Lauderdale, Ft. Myers and San Diego; its Midwest Connect regional jet service will be terminated at Baltimore, Md.; Hartford, Conn.; Louisville, Ky.; Muskegon, Mich.; Raleigh/Durham, N.C.; St. Louis, Mo.; San Antonio, Tex.; and Wausau/Stevens Point, Wis. As expected, Midwest Airlines will also end its non-stop flights from Milwaukee to Los Angeles and to Seattle/Tacoma, but both routes will still be available as one-stops via Kansas City, with no change of aircraft. The carrier’s Milwaukee-Orlando route will be suspended from September 8 to October 20, after which it will operate as a seasonal service from October 21-April 30. Kansas City-Orlando non-stops will be discontinued. Midwest Connect’s Kansas City-Madison, Wis. service will also be discontinued. Midwest noted that after the route reductions it will continue to serve 32 cities. It also said that it plans to expand its code-share operations with Northwest Airlines this fall, adding another 100 city pairs.

Just after Midwest announced it would discontinue Milwaukee-Los Angeles non-stop service, Northwest Airlines – which owns a minority stake in Midwest – said it will begin its own MKE-LAX daily non-stops on September 6. Meanwhile, AirTran Airways, which also flies MKE-LAX and which failed in a Midwest takeover attempt last year, said it plans to boost its Milwaukee presence by adding a new MKE-Ft. Lauderdale route in November, and by adding more frequencies from Milwaukee to Baltimore/Washington, Orlando, Ft. Myers, Tampa and Las Vegas.