Alaska Airlines bolsters West Coast schedule with new routes – The Points Guy

Adding Southern California capacity

Alaska is making some other changes to its West Coast network come Oct. 1.

At that time, the carrier will restart a route from LAX to Reno-Tahoe International Airport (RNO) in Nevada that it operated last summer. It will now operate twice daily year-round.

Alaska will also add frequencies to nine different routes out of LAX, including additional daily round trips to its major hubs like Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA) and Portland International Airport (PDX), plus more flights to a handful of other cities like Eugene, Oregon; San Jose and Santa Rosa, California; Boise; and Las Vegas.

Altogether, Alaska is upping its LAX capacity by a quarter, the carrier noted.

Factoring in both Los Angeles and San Diego, Alaska’s seats were already set to grow by 10% over 2023 (though still short of 2019 levels) prior to these additional routes and frequencies, according to data from aviation analytics firm Cirium.

“We’re committed to growth in Southern California, and I’m excited that we will offer our largest schedule out of the region in recent years,” Alaska Airlines’ regional vice president Neil Thwaites said in a statement announcing the news.

Alaska touting business travel bounce back

It’s worth noting that this West Coast scale-up in service comes just days after Alaska executives noted a “material step up” in business travel, particularly helped by increased travel within the tech sector.

Travel through corporate accounts on the carrier surged 30% in February over 2023 levels and 22% over the entire first quarter, chief commercial officer Andrew Harrison said on the company’s first-quarter earnings call this week.