[caption id="attachment_48387" align="alignright" width="403" caption="Alaska Air currently serves Santa Rosa with Bombardier Q400 turboprop aircraft."][/caption]
SANTA ROSA -- Passenger volume at Charles M. Schulz--Sonoma County Airport in January was up 2.3 percent from a year before, according to figures released this afternoon.
Last month, 14,680 travelers came to and left from the airport, compared with 14,355 passengers in January 2011, according to figures provided by Alaska Airlines, the airport's only commercial carrier.[poll id="3"]
For the year 2011, the airport reached an all-time high in ridership, with 207,188 total passengers, an increase of 9.8 percent over 2010.
The recent uptick in volume comes as significant changes at the airport take shape, chiefly an $84 million safety upgrade and expansion of the airport's runways. The Sonoma County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously in favor of the project, which is expected to enable larger commercial air craft to land and depart, thus expanding its reach.
Alaska Airlines also recently announced a shakeup in its offerings. The airline added a new flight to San Deigo, and additional flight to Los Angeles and plansto discontinue service to and from Las Vegas, a move that caught many off guard.
Alaska Airlines, through Horizon Air, currently operates five flights a day from Santa Rosa to Portland, Seattle, Las Vegas and Los Angeles.
