Lincoln Airport announces flights to seven new cities

LINCOLN, Neb (KLKN) – The Lincoln Airport announced Thursday that a number of new cities are on the menu for flying in and out of Lincoln, which officials hope will draw more business, tourism and general travel.

The new destinations are Minneapolis, Austin, Orlando, Nashville, Dallas, Atlanta and Las Vegas.

Flights to each of those cities will not be daily but will be scheduled twice a week.

You pay a base amount for fares, with additional fees for baggage and specific seating.

Starting in June, the flights will be offered through the new Red Way charter carrier, which was created to help the airport develop new options for flights.

“So the mission of Red Way is simple,” said David Haring, executive director of the Lincoln Airport Authority. “We want to provide our community with the right destinations, at the right time, at the right price, all on a product that is unparalleled in customer service. ”

Flights through Red Way will be operated by GlobalX Air Tours and Global Crossing Airlines, which offers charter flights out of Lincoln.

Ed Wegel, the founder, chairman and CEO of GlobalX, said that the continued growth of Lincoln is “supportive of a robust air service network” and that the city deserves more options at its airport.

“Lincoln represents the very best of America,” he said. “Hometown values, hardworking citizens and a real zest for capitalism. We’ve looked at the numbers. There’s been a lot of research and analysis that’s gone into this, and we know that this is a winner.”

Officials said that since the start of the pandemic, LNK has been struggling to keep up in the market, despite flights returning to mostly normal levels.

A little more than a year ago, Delta Airlines also stopped making flights to Lincoln, impacting travel from Lincoln to Minneapolis.

Jason Ball, president and CEO of the Lincoln Chamber of Commerce, said having these destinations will help grow both Lincoln and Nebraska’s economy by connecting businesses and their workers to more cities.

“Anytime you can add new direct flights from the Lincoln Airport, it’s gonna create new activity based off of that,” he said.

Ball said that whenever you make it easier to travel to a city, “you’re gonna have more business flights that are gonna want to take advantage of that opportunity.”

To accommodate these new flights, a new 35,000-square-foot addition has been made.

The $55 million expansion and renovation will consolidate some of the Transportation Security Administration operations while expanding passenger gates and creating new restaurant and concession areas.

Mayor Leirion Gaylor Baird said about $3 million of American Rescue Plan Act funds are being put into this project to help bring Red Way and the new destinations to Lincoln.

The new terminal will be opening in May.