Santa Rosa airline traffic up 31 percent in September

Figures released Friday show the number of passengers flying through Santa Rosa’s Charles M. Schulz–Sonoma County Airport in September dropped slightly from August, but was up 30.9 percent over last year.

More flights, fuller planes on Alaska Airlines and newcomer Allegiant Air helped boost airline travel, based on the Oct. 14 figures.

Passenger traffic in September also increased 21.2 percent from September of last year, according to a monthly report from the airport, run by the county of Sonoma.

Las Vegas-based low-cost airline Allegiant began flights between Santa Rosa and Las Vegas and Phoenix on May 19.

The latest report reveals that total passengers September was 29,046 compared with 32,836 in August, and 23,963 a year before. For the year to date, passengers have totaled 252,012, up from 192,540 in the first nine months of the year.

The load factor - how full the seats were on each plane - was 84 percent year to date, up 6.3 percent, so the airport saw a slight increase in ridership as well.

In September, there were 224 arrivals and departures. The numbers were released in the same week airport officials announced American Airlines would begin service from the facility in February, 2017.