Which 4 Destinations will Southwest Airlines Fly in From?

Airport 2 Minutes

Without doubt you recall back in October it was announced that Southwest Airlines would be bringing their canyon blue jets over our emerald waters and gently be landing them at our brand-spankin new airport in Panama City Beach. People cheered, some teared up and the excitement spread like butter. Dubbed after two tries the Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport, St. Joe and Southwest partnered along with Coastal Vision 3000 and area TDC’s to come up with a dynamic plan to grown our area’s industry, tourism and hopefully population. When the big announcement was made, 8 flights a day were committed to from 4 different locations, but the locations were to be named in December.

And, no we don’t have those destinations to announce yet, but that should come in short notice, I’m sure.  The purpose of this post is to see what destinations you think should be flying into our area. Of course, some of you who have family or frequent certain destination will be biased, but consider what places would bring the most people to Panama City Beach.

There will be 4 destinations total and tons of people have sounded off here on pcbdaily as to their preference, but let’s here from you all one more time.

I’ve created a poll in the sidebar to track, so please vote there.  In addition, share with us in the comments below your pick!  Please note, cheaters, that if you select one destination a million times, we’ll know the survey has been tampered with and you will be dealt with by tar and feather. All of the votes are logged by ip address.

Here are the cities we think are most likely to be future feeder markets for Panama City Beach:

Nashville, TN – tons of people from Nashville come down here already.

Birmingham, AL – tons of people from Birmingham come here already as well.

LaGuardia, NY (New York City) – There has been a huge interest in our area from people in New York in the last year.  This is highly evident in the pcbdialy analytics.

Chicago, IL (Midway) – We beleive this to be a huge sleeper market that’s actually already feeding fairly heavily into our area, beleive it or not.

Dallas, TX (LoveField) – Forget the Wright Amendment, who cares if they can’t really fly here until 2014, bring ’em anyway!

Here are some others that we added to the poll to see what YOU think.  If there are any destinations you think should be on this poll that aren’t, let us know in the comments and we’ll do our best to add them.

  • New Orleans, LA
  • Orlando, FL
  • Jackson, MS
  • Columbus, OH
  • Indianapolis, IN
  • Detroit, MI
  • Raleigh/Duram, NC
  • St. Louis, MO
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Published by Jason Koertge

Published

173 thoughts on “Which 4 Destinations will Southwest Airlines Fly in From?”

  1. Please add Baltimore and Philadelphia to the list, Southwest has a good presence at both of these airports. These cities could serve as connections for people flying to PCB from all over the Northeast…

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  2. Add BWI to the list. Its closeness to Washington and connection to our military bases would be a good addition to your list.

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  3. Your poll is broken. The header says to pick 4, but when I vote, I get an error message saying to vote for only 1.

    Anyway, I agree with the two above. Baltimore must be added to the list. We need a cheap fare to the Washington, DC area for our military bases and supporting businesses.

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  4. Definately BWI; its proximity to D.C. and all the eastern seaboard only makes sense. Of course, the fact that we fly there and back two to four times a year doesnt influence my decision at all!!

    Cara

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  5. The poll is allowing only one selection instead of four. Also, please add Houston, TX (HOU) to the list; it’s our 4th largest city.

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    1. I AGREE OMAHA…..OMAHA…….and did I mention OMAHA…there is not a body of water around my old stomping grounds that is worth looking at !!!! I think you must tap into this market. The people from the midwest (this includes the Chicago area) are honest and hard working.

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  10. Houston, TX Hobby Airport should make the list for sure! So many people come to PCB from Texas and so many people that fly on Southwest from the west coast connect through Houston. Houston would be a huge market for PCB!!!!!

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      2. Sorry guys, Atlanta isn’t on the list because Southwest does not service ATL. This poll is Southwest Specific. There are other airlines that will definitely continue to bring Atlanta visitors to our area.

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  12. I think Louisville, Ky would be a good choice. I am biased because I live there and own vacation property in P.C.B. however I have a lot of rentals and inquiry’s from people in the Louisville Area. There are several P.C.B. condo owners that live in Louisville. Geographicly its a good distance. Birmingham and even Nashville are too close to fly when you could drive in the same time it took to arrive/depart and fly.

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    1. Nashville is our number 1 choice from a rental management standpoint. We have tons of visitors that come down from a 50 mile radius of Nashville and lots more would be interested if they didn’t have to drive. Traffice to our VisitPCB.com website is heavily weighted from this area as well.

      Plus, Don must not have driven from Nashville in a while as it is 7 1/2 to 8 hour drive versus a 1-hour flight each way. :}

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  14. What about Louisville? Half the people I know here have property in northwest Florida, and the other half vacation there whenever possible!

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  16. Miami of course. Alot of people in our whole
    area would be interested in flying out
    of here to go down south. The keys are
    right there as well as commuter planes
    flying out to the Bahamas.

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      2. You’re absolutely right, this is supposed to be about getting people HERE, not necessarily from here (although Southwest may have a different opinion).

        I lived in Miami and Fort Lauderdale for 20 years. People with families in South Florida take their families and kids to beaches North of there. News flash; South Beach is completely topless…not the right environment for your kids. Everybody I knew in SFL took their family vacations in Ft. Meyers, Naples, Hutchinson Island, etc. because they were easy to get to. Southwest would make us also easy to get to.

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    1. Good point…however, until PCB incorporates a better citywide transportation service the people from Canada will have to rent a car. WOW that would be so expensive for three or four months.

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      1. Some people come from Canada for much shorter visits… Not everyone is retired and able to stay for months at a time!!!!

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  20. Hopefully Southwest will smile upon us Cincinnati “midwesterners” who would be happy to drive to Indianapolis, Louisville, or Columbus for a direct flight to Panama City Beach! We have learned from experience that if you can’t get a direct flight, it makes more sense to drive.

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  21. I live in Birmingham and while I would much appreciate the option/convenience of a direct flight, the focus might should be on markets that will provide the highest volume of tourism/travel with a higher probability of investing in the real estate market in the panhandle area. Ie – Dallas, Charlotte, Nashville, …Maybe even Chicago and NYC.

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  23. BWI please!! I know a lot of people from Northeast (flying from Hartford, Manchester, and Providence – all Southwest stops) have to stop in BWI before flying another leg into the Southeast or elsewhere. When I went to school at ‘BAMA, I flew from Birmingham to BWI to PVD for my trips home over the holidays and breaks. BHM is too close for a stop. Nashville, good; Dallas or Houston, good; Chicago, good and add BWI as this is a huge SWA stop from the Northeast.

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  24. I hope they choose LAX. You can pick all the east coast you want but until we have a connection to the west coast, we are still isolated. LAX is international and would allow you to fly to Hawaii, Asia, Australia for a lot less than you would pay now. I would also love to see all of Hollywood!

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    1. …or SNA (don’t forget that Orange County alone generates it’s own economy – it has its own isolated recources across the industry board). I know there are many potential property investors that are looking to spend on a sound community like in the Emerald Coast…

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  25. Jason, I think your suggested feeder markets for Southwest are spot on. Atlanta would not be a consideration since Southwest does not serve that market.

    I love your website and the updates!

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  26. We definitely need one Texas port as a gateway to the west. Its always been so expensive to fly out west from here. I chose Dallas but Houston would be good too.

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  28. I would definitely think Chicago makes sense. It already has a large SW hub with people flying nonstop from other area’s in the Midwest such as Minneapolis, Detroit and St. Louis into Midway.

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  34. I live in Atlanta but has anyone been to Fort Lauderdale in the last 10 years !!!! Well I have, and believe me I do not want all of the snotty, fast-paced east coasters on our beaches. I understand the mentality that you need to live in the big city (dog eat dog world) but the good folks from Nebraska, Iowa, and the Dakotas just don’t have have to live like in that kind of environment. Yeah I know there are plenty of agricultural areas in the Eastern part of the United States, however, I do not think the Midwest (OMAHA) should be left out of the mix.

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  35. I would love to see Little Rock or Memphis. It would save my family and me a 10-11 hour drive every summer! And it would be a nice, quick weekend getaway for the hubby and me!

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  36. Nashville would be great (almost 8 hour drive). Birmingham is too close. Doesn’t Texas have pretty good of thier own? I hope they choose placed that will bring people that would not have come here otherwise. We need places that do not have their own local beaches.

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  37. Logically, if they fly IN , they will then fly OUT and the only two links listed to get US out to destinations south, like Mexico, Latin America and the Bahamas are Orlando (cheap seats south from there!) and Houston which also connects. Please think about how expensive it is for US to get anywhere without hav ing to fly through Ft. Walton or Atlanta! Makes sense to me!

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  39. I think Washington DC and Ft. Lauderdale / Miami areas. DC would be good for our military and bring visitors from that broad area here. Easy access to Ft. Lauderdale/Miami areas would be nice to visit all the attractions down in that area.

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  40. hopefully Columbus, Ohio. There are a lot of people up
    here I’m sure would take advantage of it. Also I could
    get there more often than 1x a year. Sounds like something
    “doable” for a group of girls to have a mini vacation!!

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  41. I like Philadelphia, maybe thats cause I’am from South Jersey. Boston would be great and I chose Detriot because my wife is from Korea and a lot of international flights from Japan, Korea, and China arrive at Detroit. Detroit is close to our Northern Friends, many Canidans would use Detroit. Ohio is a good choice also. I dont know if the numbers are still good but some years back I remember reading 80% of the US Population lives in the North East and between Philadephia & Boston, Chicago and the East Coast.

    I’am here, maybe we could all get them other yankees to relax, not move so fast.

    Many Europeans trave to Orlando. A lot more would vist NWF if they could get here by air rather than drive.

    But then, its true we get most of our visitors now from Nashville, Houston, New orleans and othe points in the southeast. So its a real hard choice. BWI is also very inportant to our Military travelers. Tough Choices.

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  42. I thought part of the impetus was to bring in more visitors to our area through the new airport and Southwest Airlines. I see a lot of talk about adding airports because a lot of people from there come here. How about adding hubs that will bring new buyers and visitors?

    I agree with Kevin’s rationale on the West Coast access. We also need a South Florida connection to tap into the South and Central American and European markets that aren’t suffering from the same economy that we are.

    Sorry Mildred and Kimberly but Southwest doesn’t fly to or from Atlanta.

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  43. FLL Ft. Lauderdale International should be added. If you want an international crowd that is where the Europeans will connect from.

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