First Boise flight a ‘big win’

After the silver, black and gold Vandal airplane destined for Boise rolled up to the Pullman-Moscow Regional Airport terminal Wednesday morning, University of Idaho President Scott Green called the inaugural flight a “big win for the Palouse.”

The airport welcomed Green and other local leaders to celebrate the first Alaska Airlines departure to the Treasure Valley.

During a prepared speech, Green thanked Moscow, Pullman, Washington State University, the Moscow Chamber of Commerce and Latah County for supporting the effort to bring Boise flights to Pullman.

“This is truly an all ships rise kind of moment for our community on the Palouse,” he said.

Green told the Daily News afterward that this has been a goal of his since he first became UI’s president in 2019. He met with Alaska Airlines senior management team in person in Seattle and had “frank conversations” about what it would take to provide Boise flights.

Green said most of the university’s students come from the Treasure Valley. Providing direct flights to Boise will benefit enrollment by making traveling back and forth convenient for those students and their families, Green said.

“We are a destination campus,” he said. “We’re not a campus where people commute to come in to go to school. We’re a campus where people live here.”

He also said it connects the university to its Boise campus as well as legislators at the state capitol.

As part of an agreement between the airline and the University of Idaho, the UI will guarantee payments of as much as $500,000 a year for three years if the flights do not make at least a 10 percent profit. The Pullman-Moscow airport will waive its landing fees for Boise flights and has pledged at least $25,000 toward advertising the new route.

Pullman-Moscow Regional Airport Director Tony Bean said he has talked to Alaska Airlines about the possibility of Boise flights every year since he became director a decade ago.

“It’s a major milestone in getting something that the community badly needs,” Bean said.

Tim Ackman, corporate sales manager for Alaska Airlines, said the new flight, offered five days a week, will provide a crucial north-south link in the Pacific Northwest.

“Now, it’s just a short flight instead of a long drive,” he said.

He said Alaska Airlines has more nonstop destinations and daily departures from Boise than any other airline. It recently added nonstop flights to Chicago and Austin, Texas.

“This winter we’ll have up to 30 daily nonstop departures from Boise to 14 destinations around the nation,” he said.

The airport is continuing to work with Alaska Airlines to potentially provide nonstop flights to Denver. It is also planning to construct a new 50,000-square-foot terminal with four gates that is expected to open in 2023.

Kuipers can be reached at akuipers@dnews.com.