Early last week, a number of area business leaders gathered to celebrate the impending return of a nonstop flight from Bradley International Airport to Amsterdam and heard optimistic forecasts for the airport’s role in the region’s economic resurgence.
The seats at the MetroHartford Alliance’s Rising Star meeting were still warm when Hartford-based United Technologies Corp. announced it was cutting 11,600 jobs and lowering its 2009 forecast.
It’s difficult to imagine a day that better reflected the painful realities facing the business community these days. For every bit of good news, there are examples of companies that are forced to shed employees and rethink their mission.
That’s what makes the accomplishments of the people who worked so hard to get the Amsterdam flight back to Bradley so remarkable.
It was only last June when Northwest Airlines ended its trans-Atlantic flights from Bradley to Amsterdam .
Six months later, the airline reversed its decision, announcing it would resume flights from Bradley to Schiphol Airport five days a week, starting this summer.
The Amersterdam flight is critical to Bradley’s financial success. State Sen. L. Scott Frantz, the airport’s former board chairman, said the service generated revenues of $14.7 million, total earnings estimated at $3.5 million and about 279 new jobs.
With so much at stake, more work needs to be done to convince area travelers that Bradley is a viable alternative to New York or Boston.
There are 472 passengers from the Hartford region who fly across the Atlantic each day, from airports other than Bradley.
There are also about 60 Connecticut travelers who each day fly out of Bradley to a hub airport somewhere in the U.S. and then on to Europe. Those travelers need to be convinced to give the Amsterdam flight a chance.
The business community also needs to support the Amsterdam flight. The stakes are too high to let it slip away again.
