Last week, Continental Airlines said it was abandoning its twice-daily non-stop flights from Des Moines to Newark, N.J., because it couldn’t attract enough passengers to make the route profitable. The Business Record took a few moments to speak with Gary Hagan, marketing coordinator at the Des Moines International Airport, about the loss of service and other developments at the airport.

Q: Passenger numbers continue to climb, despite Continental’s problems and other issues with the airline industry nationwide. Why?

A: We’ve been able to suppress our air fares, down to the point where we’re within range of where some of nearby airports are. I think people are doing the math and beginning to realize that it may not be worth saving $50 or $60 for a three-hour commute to Omaha or Kansas City. Another factor is the increasing use of regional jets. They are really bolstering our numbers and helping smaller-sized areas like Des Moines. The regional jets are more efficient and cheaper to operate.

Q: What’s the airport’s reaction to Continental’s move?

A: Actually, we are very disappointed about it. To be quite honest, we’re kind of surprised. The numbers were up, as far as I could see. I think we were sending the planes out relatively full. It’s a numbers game and they were losing money on it. That’s why they made a business decision, so to speak, to pull the plug on it. It is a disappointing blow for us.

Q: What’s the airport going to do about it?

A: It has always been our marketing strategy that if we lose one service, we try to forge on and replace it with another. That is our overall marketing objective, to increase the amount of service for all of the flying public in Central Iowa. There’s always been demand for the Orlando market. We have talked with some providers. It’s too early within the talks to publicize anything. So far, there’s nothing concrete to talk about.

Q: What happened with Continental?

A: Within the public’s mind, they might not have made the translation that Newark was almost as close to New York City as the other airports. La Guardia is most probably the most common New York destination airport for travelers from Des Moines. I don’t think that people realized that you can fly into Newark and take the rail system into the city. It probably muddied the issue that people thought, “I am not headed to Newark. I am headed to New York City.” Business traffic was the main cross section of air passengers that we were going for. It might have been that business travelers were making decisions to travel late and had to pay more for a walk-up rate. Or maybe some businesses were tied to other airlines’ frequent-flier programs.