Another small city to fall off Frontier's route map

Frontier Airlines will end flights next month at Eugene, Ore., making it one of several smaller markets where the carrier is curtailing service.

For Eugene, Frontier's seasonal thrice-weekly service to Denver will end late next month, and the company appears unlikely to return to the airport new year, according to a report in The Register-Guard newspaper of Eugene.

"This is definitely a disappointment," Eugene Airport Director Tim Dolls says to The Register-Guard. "We hate to lose any air service at all."

Still, airport officials say Frontier's departure isn't likely to have a major impact there. Frontier currently accounts for just three of the airport's average of 28 weekly departures – good for about a 4% marketshare. And airport officials says they're still projecting a new record for passengers this year.

As for Frontier, Eugene is just the latest city to drop off the carrier's route map. The moves come as the airline appears to be shifting its focus under the ownership of Indigo Partners, which bought the company late last year.

Eugene joins several other small cities – including Bakersfield, Calif.; Bismarck, N.D.; Fresno; Santa Barbara, Calif. – where Frontier has announced plans to "suspend" service between now and January. The carrier has suggested in some reports it could come back to those cities on a seasonal basis -- which is how those markets currently show up on Frontier's online route map -- but it wasn't clear how likely that was.

Instead, Frontier seems to be focusing on building up its presence in bigger markets. For example, Frontier has announced a number of new routes in recent months at major airports such as Chicago O'Hare, Phoenix, Cleveland and Washington Dulles. Frontier also has recently detailed plans to ramp up flights in Philadelphia and Miami, announcing a number of new nonstop routes from each of those cities.

The strategy – growing from anywhere from a half-dozen to as many as 20 nonstop routes from those major big-city airports – appears to mimic a strategy that's been successful for Spirit Airlines. Spirit adopted that model under ownership of Indigo, which has since sold its stake in that carrier. Frontier also has been trying to remake itself into an "ultra low-cost carrier," a niche that also includes Spirit.