Pittsburgh International Airport could lose a route to and from a destination in Pennsylvania, depending on the decision of the U.S. Department of Transportation.
DOT is set to pick later this year on its choice for to serve Lancaster through Essential Air Service, a federally subsidized program designed to connect rural communities with bigger cities like Pittsburgh, Chicago and Charlotte where there are many flight choices. EAS sprung out of airline deregulation in the 1970s and the federal government subsidizes flights to make it financial viable, often several million dollars a year per route for the airline to make up the millions of dollars each route loses annually.
Southern Airways Express serves several EAS cities in Pennsylvania with Bradford, DuBois and Lancaster having several flights a day to and from Pittsburgh International Airport. Southern’s four-year contract with the DOT at Lancaster runs out at the end of the year and the DOT recently received bids for the new service that will begin Jan. 1, 2026, or soon after.
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