Pouring Cold Water on Breeze Plans

Breeze Airways started operating at Westchester County Airport (HPN) on June 28th, after publicizing its plans to offer direct flights to Las Vegas and the west coast as well as the southeast.  However, the storm clouds gathered over their plane in the image above are foreboding.  A Breeze media release prior to the inaugural flight here at HPN announced, "We've...had to postpone some new routes, from Savannah to Providence, Westchester, and New Orleans; Westchester to Jacksonville, and Las Vegas to Charleston and Huntsville."  A Breeze VP also stated to the Westmore News that, "We will be postponing our service to the West Coast out of Westchester County Airport to late Fall or early Winter.

Breeze is the brainchild of JetBlue founder David Neeleman.  Neeleman has long favored Westchester, with JetBlue becoming the largest commercial airline at the county airport.  The county and airport have welcomed Neeleman's companies with open arms -- and water spouts. 

The Coalition to Prevent Westchester Airport Expansion is not opposed to new airline operations at the airport so long as they abide by Westchester's Terminal Use Procedures (TUP) law ( to review a copy of the law, see our website Resources page under Airline Limitations). This TUP law has been vetted by both the FAA and the courts and recognizes the capacity of the Main Terminal at the airport to be 240 passengers per half-hour (arriving and departing combined) with no more than 4 active gates.  The County has been able to mandate that airlines use the Main Terminal and abide by its limitations, including signing an agreement not to mount legal challenges and to participate in a lottery system to determine which airlines get to use the terminal's limited capacity at what times.  Airlines can add new flights at times when there is spare capacity, as Breeze has done.  This system, while not perfect, limits airline flight traffic to more acceptable levels.  Private and corporate aircraft face no such legal limits and account for most of the growth in large jet planes at the airport.

According to the July 8th Westmore News, "in the last few weeks Breeze has been forced to cancel more than its share of flights and routes, most notably leaving passengers stranded in Hartford and Akron...and nationally, where it has had to postpone the introduction of its brand new A22-300 aircraft."  It is these planes that Breeze is counting on to enable the first transcontinental airlines flights out of Westchester.  Breeze's spokesperson told the Westmore that "supply chain issues, pilot training, and...flying hours for our polots flying the A220-300" are to blame for their recent struggles.  Meanwhile, local residents will balance the disappointment at more convenient travel options with the relief of fewer overhead jet flights.