The new flight schedule is a huge win for local businesses, Alpena travelers, and the surrounding communities. It’s been years since we’ve had a commercial aircraft overnight in Alpena. This new schedule allows for business travelers to arrive at their destination earlier, thus increasing productivity, reducing expenses, and increasing profitability. The same is true for return flights, as they can stay later in the day at a remote location. Prior to this schedule change, I would need to travel the day before a meeting, stay at a hotel for an extra day on the front-end, and incur other added expenses due to the extra day. Now, I can leave Alpena in the morning and be at a customer location by early afternoon. I’m also able to stay at a customer location through the morning on Friday and be home the same day. This was not possible before. Because of the prior schedule, I needed to travel on the weekends in order to accommodate my customer’s needs. In other words, I was spending money in places other than Alpena two days for every trip. In addition, extra staff hours have been added at the airport, SkyWest-Delta crew overnight in Alpena and help the local economy with hotel and restaurant expenses. There is no downside to this change. I’ll be using SkyWest out of Alpena whenever I can.

Bryan Dort

Alpena