Southwest Airlines has chosen Denver over Nashville, Tenn., and Houston for a major expansion that could bring more than 1,000 new jobs to Denver International Airport over the next eight years.
The Colorado Economic Development Commission awarded Southwest, which applied under the code name Project Garfield, $12.5 million in job growth incentive tax credits Thursday morning at a meeting held in Cañon City.
“While we are still firming up our plans, the package makes Denver more attractive to long-term growth including the possibility of adding more flights and more jobs,” Jason Van Eaton, Southwest’s senior vice president of government affairs and real estate, said in an email.
To receive the full incentive, the Dallas-based airline must add 1,013 full-time jobs paying an average annual wage of $128,115. It has eight years to make the hires.
Dan Landson, a Southwest spokesman, emphasized that the hiring won’t come all at once. As market demand grows, more flights will be added, which in turn will require adding more baggage handlers, gate agents, flight attendants and pilots.
Southwest ranks as DIA’s second-largest carrier, behind United Airlines, in the number of flights, with hometown Frontier Airlines holding the third slot. But measured in terms of local passengers moved around the country, Southwest is the largest carrier, Landson said.
“Denver is our fastest-growing city in our network,” Van Eaton said, “and we look forward to continuing serving the region’s travelers while connecting them to the places that are important in their lives with our world-class hospitality and low fares.”
DIA has launched a $1.5 billion expansion that will add 39 gates on all three concourses and boost capacity by 30%, spokesperson Emily Williams said.
Southwest has asked for all 16 of the new gates coming to Concourse C, where the airline currently has 24 gates. Spirit Airlines has two gates and Alaska Airlines has one on C.
Williams said the airport will assign the new gates within the next six months, with the concourse expansions expected to wrap up by the end of 2021.
Sam Bailey, vice president of economic development at the Metro Denver EDC, said the jobs aren’t just tied to adding new gates, but include positions that might have gone to other cities, such as operations staff and the basing of flight crews.
“There were other markets they were considering,” Bailey said. “We had to make the case that metro Denver was the place for the net new growth.”
Local economic developers spent months wooing Southwest executives, including visits in Dallas with the company’s top leaders, he said.
Dallas is Southwest’s largest employment hub, with 5,800 airport-based positions and 6,200 headquarters jobs. Chicago Midway is home to 5,400 Southwest workers, followed by Baltimore/Washington International with 4,800 and Phoenix Sky Harbor International with 4,600.
DIA ranks fifth in the Southwest system with 4,300 jobs. But it has the potential to jump a couple of slots if it continues to outpace Baltimore and Phoenix next decade.
The hiring plans are the latest in a series of moves Southwest has made to deepen its commitment to Denver.
In May, Southwest CEO Gary Kelly announced a $100 million investment in a new maintenance facility in Denver capable of holding three Boeing 737 aircraft during the company’s annual meeting, which was held in Denver.
“Our investment here has paid off very handsomely. We are adding more flights this year and we are planning for more growth in the future,” Kelly said at the time. “(This hangar) is further evidence, of course, of our investment in the community.”
Southwest chief revenue officer Andrew Watterson, while in Denver for a company retreat in August, estimated the additional 16 gates the company is pursuing would allow the airline to have more than 100 additional flights per day on top of the 200 to 225 it can now handle with its 24 gates.
“We’re proud to pay top-of-the-industry wages and provide great benefits to our employees, but we keep our costs low by keeping our people busy and the assets busy. That means that our planes fly a little bit more, our gates have more departures and our employees handle more flights,” Watterson said in August.
Besides Southwest Airlines, the Economic Development Commission approved two other job growth incentive tax credit requests Thursday morning.
Project Gemini, the code name for the U.S. subsidiary of a Japanese pharmaceutical firm, is considering metro Denver for a new manufacturing plant that could employ 175 people making an average annual wage of $121,546.
The company, which specializes in antibody therapeutics, was approved for up to $3.67 million in incentives.
Project Flywheel, an outdoor recreation company looking to expand in Colorado, received $2.8 million in incentives tied to creating up to 92 new jobs paying an average annual wage of $114.141.
2019-11-22 13:00:00Z
https://www.denverpost.com/2019/11/22/southwest-airlines-expansion-incentives-denver-international-airport/
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