Southwest to fly Philadelphia-Boston route

Southwest Airlines will begin flying nonstop from Philadelphia to Boston in June, providing another choice for a popular route and reducing ticket costs at the same time.

The nation's largest low-fare carrier is taking on US Airways, which now has a lock on the Philadelphia-Boston market. Southwest hopes to steal away business travelers with cheap fares.

At a dedication yesterday of an expansion of Philadelphia International Airport's Terminal E, with seven new Southwest gates, the discount carrier said it would begin five daily nonstop round-trips to Boston Logan Airport on June 27.

Tickets went on sale yesterday, with an introductory one-way fare as low as $59. The fare sale is in effect through April 18 and available only at www.Southwest.com, for flights from June 27 through Aug. 13. The $59 fare also applies to Southwest's other Boston-area airports: Providence, R.I., and Manchester, N.H.

US Airways, with a hub in Philadelphia, has 16 weekday nonstop flights to Boston. A one-way March 16 nonrefundable nonstop coach seat was priced at $550 yesterday. A round-trip with a March 17 return pushed the total cost to $1,100. The same price was offered for a nonstop flight leaving May 27 and returning May 28.

By last night, US Airways already was matching some of Southwest's lower fares. Its Web site showed $59 fares for the Philadelphia-to-Boston flights on June 28.

And Southwest's arrival is likely to have an enduring impact on US Airways' pricing. An Aug. 17 one-way coach nonstop ticket to Boston was $75, and the same price was offered for Sept. 14.

"We're really excited about this," said Southwest spokesman Paul Flaningan. "This is a route everyone wanted. When we opened Boston seven months ago, flying there from Baltimore and Chicago, this was the one route people in Boston were asking about.

"It was one of the routes Boston really wanted. Southwest has been in Philadelphia nearly six years. It is one of the routes we are asked about here in Philadelphia as well," Flaningan said.

To commemorate the new route to Boston, Southwest has a new Web site dedicated to Philadelphia travelers, where additional fare sales and rewards credits can be found: www.Southwest.com/philly.

The airport's $45 million Terminal E expansion is part of a $300 million makeover of Terminals D and E that began several years ago, after the arrival of Southwest in 2004.

The fan-shaped extension at the end of Concourse E adds seven gates for aircraft, a 500-seat passenger waiting area, a mini-food court with new concessions, and an art exhibit of 45 cloud forms made of stainless steel netting.

"We wanted to have this comfortable for the traveling public," who will be able to sit and plug in their laptops while waiting to board planes in the revamped Terminal E, said Karen Daroff, president of Daroff Design Inc. of Philadelphia, the project's architect.

The improvements do for Southwest, AirTran, United, Delta, Continental, and Air Canada - all of which fly out of Terminals D and E - what a $139 million makeover of Terminals B and C did in 1998 for US Airways.

About a fourth of Philadelphia passengers depart and arrive through Terminals D and E.

Southwest, Philadelphia's second-busiest carrier, acted as general contractor for the Terminal E face-lift, the latest phase of a multistage project.

It is the airport's largest construction project since the International Terminal opened in 2003.

In December 2008, a 204,000-square-foot "connector" building opened - wedged between Terminals D and E - with a 14-lane passenger-security checkpoint, a mall with 10 shops, and a view of the airfield. (Previously there were four security lanes in Terminal D and four in Terminal E.)

On Friday, a new D-E baggage-claim building with nine carousels is scheduled to open and connect the existing bag-claim areas for Terminals D and E.

In May, an automated bag-sorting system with high-technology explosives-detection machines that screen bags at a rate of 750 an hour will be completed on a floor below the D-E passenger screening. After testing, the system should be ready for use in the fall.

By the end of 2010, the passenger ticket counters will be replaced in Terminals D and E, to include 23 additional counters and new escalators and stairs.

These changes mean passengers can now walk from Terminal A - where international flights arrive and depart - all the way to Terminal E without having to go through security screening more than once.

The $300 million tab for the entire project will be paid by airport revenue bonds funded by the airlines, federal grants, and passenger facility charges, which are fees of up to $4.50 imposed on departing passengers for use on Federal Aviation Administration-approved projects.

Looking to the future, airport officials want to revamp Terminal F, where nearly 400 commuter and regional jet flights depart daily. That $125 million-to-$130 million project would link Terminal F to Terminal E so passengers would be able to walk from A to F - the full length of the airport - after going through security only once.