Air travel to/from Tri-Cities? (Seattle, Spokane: car rental, rental, hotel)

[junkwoody]

We're considering moving from the Sacramento region to the Tri-Cities area, and one of my biggest concerns is how easily my in-laws can travel from San Diego to visit.

They have it pretty easy while we're living near Sacramento, since Southwest (among others) has multiple nonstop flights per day between the two cities. The travel time is only about an hour and a half, and airfare can be pretty cheap if you get them well in advance.

It looks like there aren't many options flying in or out of Pasco; I don't see any chance of them making a nonstop flight (not that I expected to!), but the total flight times seem to be more line 5-6 hours depending on when and where the layover is (Las Vegas, PDX, Seattle, SLC, etc.). Can anyone give me more information about what flying out of Pasco is like, or if its worth driving somewhere else for flights like Spokane or Boise?

Also, are the commuter flights to/from Pasco typically the little 14-seat prop planes, or something larger? I'm not sure my in-laws could bring themselves to climb into something that small without being heavily sedated :v)

Thanks!

[tcres]

I think we are pretty lucky here when it comes to air travel for a community this size.

Allegiant Air - Las Vegas, Phoenix/Mesa
Delta - Salt Lake City
Horizon Air - Seattle
United - San Francisco, Denver

Delta and United fly on regional jets, Horizon on dual turbo props and Allegiant uses large jets. The smallest plane is the dash 8 which holds about 70 people.

I think the smaller jets and props are usually more comfortable then the larger jets.

[j_k_k]

When we leave here for elsewhere there's typically a prop-driven or small jet hop to Seattle, Portland or Salt Lake, then connect elsewhere. It's actually a pretty decent airport situation, sustained in some significant degree by Hanford-related passenger traffic. One terminal, five gates (the accordion walkways have come along since I moved here in '97; before that it was always walk across the tarmac), two baggage carousels, lots of parking and not unreasonably priced. The flying out part is actually pretty good since there is a limit to how long the check-in or security lines can be since, unless there has been a massive backup for weather reasons, there is a limit to just how many people can want out of here at a given time.

It is impossible to fail to meet your party (everyone passes through a 10' wide area to leave the terminal) and impossible to get the wrong baggage carousel (since normally only one of them is even in use). Plenty of car rental desks and taxis, some hotel shuttles I believe. Compared to trying to start your trip in O'Hairy or Orlanduh or some other zoo, it's refreshing.

[M3 Mitch]

I'll just add that Delta runs one or two flights with what looks like a "runt 737" - I forget the correct designation, Embrair something I think - but it even has a small first class section. I even got upgraded once on it.

Back before 9-11, Delta was in and out of here with 737 and 727 aircraft several times a day.

FWIW the regional jets are about as fast as a 737, maybe a bit faster, so the trip to Salt Lake is only about an hour.

[junkwoody]

Thanks for the input everyone; sounds like the air travel is pretty good for the area -- we're lucky right now to live in a smaller town happens to be 20 minutes from an airport for a city with a population of about a million...

[j_k_k]

One drag about living here is that faraway relatives don't realize that not everything in Washington is near Seattle. So it's possible to get family members who call to let you know they will have a four-hour layover in Sea-tac tomorrow and would you like to swing by just to hang out together? That this would require six total hours of driving, of course, will not occur to them. Or: they want to come and visit you, but it costs a little extra to make the hop to Pasco, so they think you should just come and get them in Portland or Seattle. After all, it can't be that far, right?

[tcres]

And I personally do not feel that it is worth it to drive to Seattle or Spokane when you factor in gas and the time involved.

[skinem]

I generally agree with all that has been said here, but I have found that on rare occasions, it was worth a trip to Portland, Spokane or Seattle to catch a plane...there were times when we would just spend the night before the flight in one of those towns, eat at a nice place, catch a show or something, and still come out cheaper than flying out of TC. But, that was always for flights going back east.

One problem I've run in to several times during the winter, was problems getting in or out of Pasco due to fog.

Having said the negative, I still think that TC has great air service and prices given the size of the Pasco Airport, Hair Care and Tire Center.

[MovinOutWest]

When making travel plans I usually check prices for flying out of Pasco, Spokane, Seattle, and Portland. We're planning a trip to Az in April and prices were about the same from Pasco as from any of the other airports. It used to be worth it to drive further and fly Southwest but their prices seem to have gone up quite a bit in the past year, at least whenever I've checked flights with them.

[j_k_k]

Originally Posted by skinem

One problem I've run in to several times during the winter, was problems getting in or out of Pasco due to fog.

Oh, the memories that brings back. We were returning from three weeks in Ireland, Shannon to Atlanta to Salt Lake to Pasco--a very long day of travel--and our plane was in sight of the lights of the Tri-Cities. Then the plane banked, fairly hard, and not in a direction that seemed to make sense. The pilot came on the phone to announce that due to visibility problems with fog in the TC, we were going back to SLC.

Of course, that was the last plane out of SLC for TC that night. When we got back, the Delta people advised us that we shouldn't go past security because we would not be able to get back through it until morning, and that they were really really sorry but there was nothing they could do except hand us a bunch of airplane blankets and several cases of waters and airplane snacks, and tell us they'd see us in the morning.

We finally reached home during the afternoon of the next day after a night I'd just as soon forget and a side trip to Spokane. Irony: it's ten hours to drive from SLC to Pasco. Would have been quicker to put us on buses. More comfortable, too.

Obviously, I don't fault the pilot for making a decision, nor Delta for creating the weather. If the pilot thinks it's not safe to land, I'm glad he or she has the sand to say so, even if it's going to create a horrible inconvenience and even if, obviously, this is one of the worst imaginable times for it. And it's not like Delta should be held accountable for Mother Nature. But their handling of us was extremely callous. Nearly nothing was done to make us comfortable while we waited for Mother Nature to cooperate. Evidently they don't keep anything on hand for those situations except what they can raid from the airplane supplies. It was then that I realized how insignificant passengers really were to airlines, how hated and resented, even. Not all airline personnel, of course, but to enough to matter. It was then that I came to see flying as essentially adversarial rather than cooperative.