Easter blamed for a slower than anticipated March at Hollywood Burbank Airport
A Southwest Airlines plane takes off from what was then Bob Hope Airport in 2012. Passenger traffic in March 2016 was up over the previous year, but less than officials had anticipated.
The Easter holiday’s falling in March this year may have contributed to a smaller than projected uptick in passengers and a decrease in parking revenue that month at Bob Hope Airport, which is now being called Hollywood Burbank Airport as part of a new branding campaign.
The airfield saw 338,334 passengers go through its two terminals in March, just 902 more than in 2015, but 6,859 fewer than what officials had anticipated. It is the first month this year that the airport did not meet or exceed its budget projections for passengers.
The 0.3% rise was reported during a Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority meeting on Monday. The slight rise was far from the 5.2% hike the airfield reported in February.
Alaska Airlines led the increase with 3,104 more passengers than last year, followed by Delta Air Lines, which went up 463 passengers. United Airlines tallied 1,040 more than the previous year, and JetBlue Airways saw about a 1% bump in passengers.
However, ridership on American Airlines dropped by 0.68%, and Southwest Airlines dropped by 0.84%.
While passenger numbers managed to stay positive, parking revenue dropped by 4.4% in March compared to the previous year. Airport officials reported earning roughly $1.63 million in March, $75,296 less than in 2015 and $109,872 short of projections.
Mary Tromp, the airport’s parking manager, credited Easter, which she anticipated would be a slow weekend for the airfield, for the dip in parking revenue and a smaller than anticipated number of passengers.
“It does make a difference in our travel,” she said.
Tromp added that passengers stayed an average of 30 fewer minutes in the airport’s parking facilities in March. However, she noted that there was a 41% increase in $3 parking transactions compared to last year, which meant that there was an influx of ride-sharing drivers going through the airport.
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Anthony Clark Carpio, anthonyclark.carpio@latimes.com
Twitter: @acocarpio
