Early this month I got insider knowledge that Alaska Airlines was expanding their footprint in the San Diego market with new routes being Launched in 2013, which routes and new destinations was not disclosed to me, however, Alaska Airlines has finally announced them publicly. I had initially guessed the new route would be to Hawaii and sure enough, my guess was right! Well, short of right. In addition, not only is Alaska launching a new route to Hawaii, they also announced two new routes for San Diego! The two newest routes for San Diego will be San Diego’s first nonstop to Kauai and SD’s second daily nonstop to Boston!
Both new routes will be launched in the spring of 2013 and will operate daily on a Boeing 737, unfortunately, there’s been no promise to what series of the Boeing 737 Alaska will operating on this route. If it’s like most routes, both will be operating by the 737-800 offering 16 first class seats and 141 economy class seats. The more exciting part about these two routes is not only does it add two new non-stop destinations for the locals in San Diego, they are timed perfectly for connections from Horizon Air’s intrastate flights and Kauai is timed for connections from those coming from Orlando on Alaska!
In the news release from Alaska, Joe Sprague, Alaska Airlines’ vice president of marketing, stated:
“Bolstered by strong demand from the business community and vacation travelers alike, we’re thrilled to announce convenient nonstop service from San Diego to historical ‘Beantown’ and the beautiful ‘Garden Isle….With the addition of these two new routes, Alaska Airlines will offer 160 flights a week from San Diego to a dozen cities by next summer.”
I’m excited to see Alaska beef up their presence in San Diego, truly making SAN a focal city for the airline. Not only has the airline added 3 intrastate routes in the past 12 months (Fresno, Monterey and Santa Rosa), they’ve also expanded service to Honolulu, Maui, Orlando, Cabo, and Puerto Vallarta in the last few years. Now my new hope is that Alaska Airline’s will join Delta in Terminal 2, which will allow first class passengers and business class travelers access to Delta’s SkyClub when traveling. Or better yet, if United consolidates their operations in T2, maybe Alaska will take over the United Club in T1 and make it their own signature Boardroom! Hey, a guy can dream!
The new flights and frequencies are listed below and are on sale now at Alaskaair.com or any major travel website including Expedia, Priceline, CheapOair, or Hotwire. Alaska is offering an introductory price of only $129 each way to Boston (5 CPM) or $209 each way to Kauai! Also, be sure to check out AlaskaAir’s promotion page, because like normal, when Alaska launches new flights they offer double miles for Mileage plan members on the routes!
| San Diego-Boston: | ||||
| Start date | City pair | Departs | Arrives | Frequency |
| March 29 | San Diego-Boston | 9:30 a.m. | 5:55 p.m. | Daily |
| March 29 | Boston-San Diego | 6:55 p.m. | 10:13 p.m. | Daily |
| San Diego-Kauai: | ||||
| Start date | City pair | Departs | Arrives | Frequency |
| June 7 | San Diego-Kauai | 9:55 a.m. | 1:05 p.m. | Daily until Aug. 24 then Mon, Tue, Thu, Sat |
| June 7 | Kauai-San Diego | 11:05 a.m. | 7:50 p.m. | Daily until Aug. 23 then Mon, Wed, Fri, Sun |
