FlyORH: The JetBlue Inspiration For Worcester’s Airport

Thursday, August 22, 2013

Bill Randell, GoLocalWorcester MINDSETTER™

JetBlue CEO David Neeleman's book, Flying High.

About ten years ago, I was on a trip and picked up a book by JetBlue CEO David Neeleman called “Flying High” to read. The thing that I remember vividly is the CEO of JetBlue talking about investing in smaller 100-seat Embraer 190 jets that he would use to feed hubs from smaller airports. My thoughts were immediately Worcester to JFK with the new Embraer 190s, when they come in.

I went back and tried to get some information on the airport and it was very scattered. Studies here and there, three different consultants working on three new studies, and airport minutes that were not readily available. As a result, I decided to start a website called FlyORH, to tie all the information together. Over the years this has morphed into other social media outlets including Facebook, Twitter, and a blog.

At no point have I ever tried to represent myself any other then a local businessman, who has taken an interest in our airport. In other words very unofficial. That’s a good thing, since I have been able to say whatever I want. Here is a sampling of some of my past opinions:

City of Worcester should not be in the airport business and that they need to put an RFP out for the entire airport.
Allegiant was a great airline and it was a big loss when they pulled out of ORH.
Direct Air was always horrible and I warned people not to buy any of their vouchers or travel clubs.
MassPort and JetBlue is a great combination for Worcester.

I want only for Worcester Airport to be the success that I know it can be, but I will always tell you how I see it. Nobody will tell me what I should or should not say. That leads to a few comments I saw on Facebook regarding the high cost to fly out of ORH February 15th to MCO (Orlando) and returning on February 22nd.

The best way to look up prices is to go to JetBlue BestFareFinder. If you look up February, you will see that, you will see February 14 and February 15th are unavailable. Not surprising when you consider that most February school vacations are February 17th through the 24th.

Considering we only have one flight and 100 seats, these seats went fast and if you were trying to get one of the last available seats, the price must have been very high. There are some very good flights available, however, on the 13th ($236) and the 16th ($316).

It is not just Worcester; Boston has no direct flights available February 15th to Orlando on JetBlue, while Providence has some seats left at $315 and $385. It is not a case of Worcester having bad pricing, but that these tickets for this date sold out fast. You will need to either leave a different day or utilize another airport.

Maybe next year we will have more flights to avoid this problem.

Bill Randell is the President of Advantage Benefits, an insurance brokerage house specializing in employee benefits with an emphasis on health insurance, based in Worcester since 1992. He can be contacted at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter (@FlyORH).