One of the Southern Airways Cessna 208B Grand Caravan EX planes that was expected to be used if Essential Air Service is restored at the Chautauqua County Airport at Jamestown is pictured.

Chautauqua County has, again, been denied an Essential Air Service subsidy from the federal government to restore commercial air service at the Chautauqua County Airport in Jamestown.

The federal Transportation Department made the decision on June 26 in response to a proposal made by the county and Southern Airways Express LLC in May 2025.

County officials and Southern Airways had proposed scheduled commercial air service be restored from Jamestown with a new destination to Washington Dulles International Airport to provide direct connectivity to a major domestic and international hub. The proposed service would operate on a schedule accommodating both business and leisure travel, with two daily round trips, Monday through Saturday.

The 2025 proposal projected 60% full planes flying to Dulles International Airport in Washington, D.C. Depending on whether the county chose to offer 12 trips a week or 17 trips a week, the county expected between 6,642 and 9,407 passengers a year to use the airport if Essential Air Service is restored by the federal government. There would have been between 1,230 and 1,742 yearly flights from the county airport under the new proposal.

That’s a large decrease from failed proposals in 2018 and 2019 to restore Essential Air Service. The 2018 proposal estimated 2,112 scheduled flights, 17.5% fewer flights than the 2018 proposal and 36.3% fewer flights than the 2019 proposal. The 2025 passenger count for the 17 trip per week model decreased 25.1% from the 2018 proposal with Boutique Air and 36.8% from the 2019 proposal with Boutique Air.

The 2018 proposal requested subsidies of $2,500,484 in the first year of the agreement with the county and $2,562,996 the second year. The county’s 2019 proposal’s federal subsidy increased to $2,980,608 for the first year and $3,070,027 for the second year. The subsidy increases again in the 2025 proposal to $4,053,386 in the only year the subsidy is requested. That request is assuming the use of the 17 trip a week service. The subsidy would decrease to $3,641,434 if the county uses the smaller 12-trip package.

Ultimately, the federal government found those estimates to be unrealistic.

“There is no evidence in the record to support that since that time there has been a change in demand at the community sufficient to increase load factors from 20% to 60%,” Anthony Krawietz, deputy assistant secretary for aviation and international affairs, wrote in the Transportation Department’s decision. “There is also no evidence in the record to support that Southern has the ability to grow community demand in a community by such a significant volume. Indeed, the evidence in the record is to the contrary, as Southern was the air carrier that was serving the Jamestown community at the time when it had load factors of only 20%. Therefore, the department cannot find that the joint proposal is likely to result in the significant emplanement increase (to at least 6,260 total outbound and inbound passengers) needed to generate 10 enplanements per service day at Jamestown.”

The county’s proposal states Southern Airways has made several improvements to its operations since losing commercial air service at the Jamestown Airport, including the company’s System Operations Control (SOC) undergoing substantial expansion and upgrading, enhancing the airline’s capability to oversee all flight operations and respond effectively to operational challenges. The airline has achieved full staffing levels with comprehensive pilot resources, including the establishment of a new training center in DuBois, Pa. This facility enables pilots to train and gain experience in the challenging weather conditions typical of the mid-Atlantic region. Southern Airways has also made substantial investments in technology, communications resources, and fleet modernization since its earlier operations in Jamestown.

The 2024 study the county commissioned in response to a federal Transportation Request identified 1,506 passengers per day each way (PDEW) traveling within the Jamestown airport’s 90-mile catchment zone, a number that includes both local residents and visitors. Of that total, 916 passengers per day live in the Jamestown airport’s defined catchment area, while the remaining 590 (39%) are visitors traveling to the region. Sixty percent of resident passengers per day live within 45 minutes of Jamestown, with 58% of county airline travelers using the Buffalo and Pittsburgh airports, followed by Cleveland (21.6%) and Rochester (5.2%).

The county reasoned those statistics show there is demand for commercial air service in Jamestown. The federal government disagreed.

“The department has reviewed the presentation and finds that there is no evidence suggesting the market has fundamentally changed since 2018 when Jamestown was removed from the EAS program,” Krawietz wrote. “Despite the presentation asserting that there is demand in the local area, the conditions that led to high subsidy rates and low enplanements (e.g. Jamestown’s close proximity to several other commercial airports) continue to persist. For these reasons the department denies the proposal of Chautauqua County and Southern for the restoration of Jamestown to the EAS program.”