Boise Airport overcomes pandemic declines as travelers return to skies over past year
Continuing its recovery from coronavirus impacts to air travel, the Boise Airport logged one of its busiest months of 2021 in December, but was still down more than a half-million passengers last year compared to its all-time high set in 2019.
The 3.6 million passengers who traveled through the regional air hub last year was off about 12% from the annual record of more than 4.1 million passengers set two years ago, before the arrival of the global pandemic. And the 329,000-plus passengers who flew in and out of Boise last month was also down roughly 12% compared to December 2019 — to date the airport’s busiest-ever final month of the year, typically buoyed by increased holiday travel.
Passenger counts at the Boise Airport plummeted in 2020, closely mirroring those of the rest of the U.S. after the commercial air travel industry was decimated by the coronavirus. Fewer than 2 million people passed through the airport that year, which represented the lowest annual total in at least 15 years, according to airport data.
But now reapproaching local passenger records in a year still stricken with the uncertainty of the pandemic — particularly in the early months of 2021 — shows that demand for travel through Idaho has largely rebounded, said Shawna Samuelson, a Boise Airport spokesperson. The addition of new flights later this year, and return of some seasonal routes this upcoming spring and summer, also stand to grow the airport metric that helps gauge a travel market’s health.
“Just being near 2019 passenger counts is considered a success, because it was the busiest year at the airport,” Samuelson told the Idaho Statesman.
“We don’t have a crystal ball,” she added about what it could mean for 2022. “Our forward-looking schedule for the first few months of the year anticipates a similar level of demand as 2021. But I think so many things beyond our control may impact that.”
Boise’s passenger counts last year bested much of the rest of the U.S., as the air travel industry continues to climb back from the height of the pandemic in 2020. Year-end holiday travel in November and December was on the rise across the country despite omicron variant concerns, according to Transportation Security Administration data, but still down from pre-pandemic levels, according to a recent survey from national pollster Gallup.
The declines are largely tied to the considerable drop-off in business travel worldwide and ongoing variability in leisure travel, said Mike Boyd, president of the Colorado-based aviation consulting firm Boyd Group International. But, he said, Boise is less susceptible to such shifts compared with many traditional vacation destinations. Idaho is also among the group of states that make up the Rocky Mountain region previously projected to see the largest gains in air travel.
In part because of Idaho’s rapid population growth, the capital city airport has rebounded from the pandemic faster than other U.S. locations, which fits his firm’s predictions, Boyd said.
“It doesn’t surprise us at all,” he said in a phone interview. “Our forecast was Boise would be one of the top 10 fastest growing airports in the country. And the good news is, Boise is not wedded to people with surfboards, meaning leisure traffic declines, which we’re expecting, will not affect Boise as much as, say, Sarasota (Florida).”
The airport’s renewed popularity has helped speed up the need for more vehicle parking for travelers. Construction on a pair of multi-story parking garages, which was delayed in 2020 from the drop in passenger demand, will now start as soon as the end of this week, airport officials said.
“We’ve seen an increased and steady demand for air travel from our region — resulting in an increased need for parking,” Rebecca Hupp, director of Boise Airport, said in a statement.
The $56 million expansion project, paid for through bond funding, includes both a new public parking garage and employee parking garage — each five levels in height. The two garages will be built at the same time, and are expected to take between 18 and 24 months to complete.
The employee garage will include about 700 parking spaces for airline staff, rental car and retail outlet workers and TSA employees. A nearby surface parking lot currently used by airport tenants will also be freed up for public use once the employee lot is finished.
The new public garage will include about 1,150 parking spaces, and also add a new pedestrian bridge into the airport. The existing public parking areas nearest the airport will have a reduced number of spaces during construction, with airport officials directing travelers to the long-term, economy parking lot served by a shuttle located about 1 1/2 miles away off West Victory Road.
Parking revenue, which is used to fund general airport operations, including to pay bond debt, totaled about $12 million in 2019 — or about 25% of overall airport revenues. That total fell to about $7.6 million in 2020, but increased back to about $9.6 million in 2021, according to airport officials.
With the public parking garage expansion, the airport estimates revenues could grow by as much as $4.2 million each year at current pricing. If realized, parking revenue would approach nearly a third of all Boise Airport revenues to help fund a planned third terminal with up to a dozen more passenger gates, which is presently expected to be finished in late 2025 or early 2026.
This story was originally published January 26, 2022 at 3:22 PM.
