More flight cuts on the way after Labor Day

By Joe Brancatelli

CUTBACK CENTRAL

Service continues to disappear at record rates: The high price of oil continues to claim more airline service. Most of the biggest cutbacks will come after Labor Day. A representative sampling of domestic losses: Continental Airlines is dropping its flights to Daytona Beach, Florida, from its Newark hub. Delta Air Lines is pulling its flights from Yakima, Washington, to Salt Lake City. Also going: New York/Kennedy-Houston;Miami-Tallahassee; and Cincinnati-Springfield, Missouri. From its Charlotte hub, US Airways is ending flights to Sacramento and Panama City, Florida. Also disappearing: all flight service from Eugene, Oregon, and Oklahoma City. On the chopping block at United Airlines: all service to Kalamazoo, Michigan, and Bloomington/Normal, Illinois. It will drop two routes from its Chicago O’Hare hub (Spokane, Washington, and San Jose, California); two routes from its Los Angeles hub (Austin and Oakland); and the Denver-Charlotte and San Francisco-Atlanta routes.

IN THE LOBBY

The hotel openings keep on coming: The hotel business is slowing quickly as business travelers curtail their trips. But since it takes up to five years to get a hotel built, the properties in the pipeline can’t be stopped. So that’s why new hotels keep opening in the face of the slowdown. The latest premieres: the 471-room Renaissance Boston Waterfront near the edge of the city’s financial district. The 268-room Marriott Beijing Northwest between the Lido commercial district and the Wangjing High Tech Park. And three new Sheratons: a 135-room hotel in Columbia, South Carolina; a 285-room hotel in Garden Grove, near Disneyland; and a 159-room hotel in Jacksonville, Florida. The Starwood group has opened twomore of its new aloft hotels. One is at Chicago O’Hare Airport and a 130-room property is in the Pinnacle Hills area of Bentonville, Arkansas. There are also some conversions of note: Rose Hall, one of the best-known resorts in Jamaica, is now a Hilton. The property has undergone $40 million in renovations. Also from Hilton: a new hotel just 12 miles from the airport in Columbus, Ohio. And Crowne Plaza has converted the former Holiday Inn in Bloomington-Normal, Illinois.

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