Honolulu or Bust

Aloha Airlines announced that it will begin service from Orange County’s John Wayne Airport to Honolulu beginning May 1--even though the carrier’s lease is entangled in the ongoing fight over the county’s plans for an airport at El Toro.

This month, county supervisors approved lease negotiations with Aloha, which proposes the first-ever flights to Hawaii from Orange County. But the supervisors won’t consider final approval until March.

It’s an open question whether Aloha can maneuver itself through El Toro’s tentacles and free its twice-a-day Hawaii flights.

There is room at the airport for the new flights only if cargo leases with United Parcel Service and Federal Express are approved by four of the five supervisors--two of whom have said they’ll vote no. The two supervisors, who oppose an airport at the retired Marine base, have tied their approval to the county’s plans for the airfield.

Undaunted, Aloha officially announced its new service Thursday, one daily round-trip flight to Honolulu and a continuing leg to Las Vegas’ McCarran International Airport. The airline said service would be expanded June 1 to include a daily flight to Maui.

Aloha has begun taking reservations for the new flights, airline spokeswoman Julie King said. The round-trip fare is $437, with a 10% discount for Automobile Club of Southern California members. Comparatively, the round-trip fare for an American Airlines flight to Honolulu from Los Angeles International Airport is $343.

Aloha has no contingency plan for passengers booked on the flights if its lease to operate at John Wayne isn’t approved, King said.

“The flights are listed,” she said. “We’re working with the airport on the details.”

Airport officials confirmed that they are working on Aloha’s lease but said the airline cannot start service without it.

The two county supervisors who oppose an airport at El Toro protested the cargo leases earlier this month, though both said they had no problem per se with Aloha starting service. Supervisors Todd Spitzer and Tom Wilson said their support for cargo leases was jeopardized by county aggressiveness to move cargo service to El Toro as soon as possible.

If the cargo leases aren’t approved, heavily regulated John Wayne will have to give the two flights earmarked for Aloha to Fed-Ex and UPS.

“I think they’re being optimistic,” Wilson said Thursday of Aloha’s announcement.

Getting four-fifths approval for the cargo leases will be a “tough sell,” he said. He and Spitzer have demanded that before they’ll support the leases, language designating El Toro for future cargo service must be removed from a court document approved earlier this month on a 3-2 vote by supervisors.

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Spitzer said Aloha made a “bad judgment call” by announcing the new flights. He said the airline shouldn’t be selling tickets unless its lease is approved.

“I wouldn’t be so fast to say ‘Aloha’ to Hawaii from Orange County,” he said.

Aloha plans to use Boeing 737-700s, new-generation planes that passed the county’s rigorous noise tests last summer. The aircraft, to be delivered to Aloha in March and May, will be configured with 12 first-class and 112 coach seats.

In 2000, Aloha Airlines flew more than 5 million passengers, including more than 1,100 weekly flights within the Hawaiian Islands.