Airport administrator asks city council to apply for in-state air service grant

Las Cruces International Airport Administrator Andy Hume asked the Las Cruces City Council to consider applying for a two-year, $3.5 million grant from the New Mexico Department of Transportation that would help pay for air travel service between Las Cruces and Albuquerque and Santa Fe.

Speaking at the council’s July 26 work session, Hume said the funds are available because the New Mexico Legislature passed the state Rural Air Service Enhancement Act during its 2021 session and the bill was signed into law by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham in April.

With the grant, Las Cruces could “develop frequent year-round air service from here to Albuquerque and maybe Santa Fe during the legislative session,” said Kent Myers, president of Airplanners, LLC, an air service development and consulting firm, which is working with the city to develop local air service.

A 2019-20 survey showed 18,000 annual trips would be produced from Las Cruces to Albuquerque and Albuquerque to Las Cruces, or about 50 people a day each way, Myers said. Three air carriers are interested in bidding on providing local air service if the grant is approved, said Myers, who is based in Colorado.

The grant requires a 10 percent match from the city, plus about $50,000 in marketing expenses for a total cost to the city of about $400,000 over two years, Hume said.

The intrastate (within New Mexico) service “could be a good idea to get service started a little more quickly as we continue to work the interstate (between New Mexico and other states) process,” Hume said.

Bill Tomcich of Airplanners said a 2019-20 survey shows “there are about 650 inbound and outbound travelers to or from the Las Cruces area who are currently flying through the El Paso airport.”

That is 650 inbound and 650 outbound to and from Las Cruces per day, Hume said.

That’s 13.6 percent – about 237,000 – of El Paso Airport’s total annual enplanements, Tomcich said.

For Las Cruces, those numbers would support two to four daily interstate flights on 50- to 76-passenger aircraft, he said.

El Paso International Airport “had the highest load factors of any airport across the region” in February, March and April, Tomcich said. “The fact that El Paso is seeing really strong results right now is really important,” he said.

A Las Cruces air alliance public-private partnership would “encourage a grassroots level of support for air service,” Hume said, including both intrastate and interstate service.

“You really want to look at community buy-in to get that sustainability long-term,” he said.

“We have some excellent primary partners,” he said, including the Greater Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce, the Mesilla Valley Economic Development Alliance (MVEDA), Virgin Galactic, NMSU and members of the local business community.

A successful NMDOT grant application will require city council approval at a future meeting.