Two Popular Destinations Could be Added to Rochester, MN Airport’s Direct Flights

Depending on where you're going, traveling can be a really long and potentially stressful day. And if you're someone who travels by plane, you've probably made the drive from Rochester, Minnesota to MSP.

ALSO READ: MSP Adds Direct Flight to European Destination

That drive can be quite annoying, especially with construction season now happening, yay. But it seems that many of us make that drive or take a bus up to the Twin Cities to catch a flight.

RST Loses Thousands of Passengers to MSP

Our airport in Rochester, RST, has definitely noticed and they have data to back it up, too. KIMT reports that "Rochester International Airport loses 1,400 passengers a day to the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport."

1,400 per day!

So RST is looking to do something about it. And that something is adding two new direct flights to a couple of very popular destinations.

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Two New Destinations RST is Looking to Add

An aviation counseling firm called Volaire spoke to the Rochester city council about the two flights RST hopes to add the other day. The destinations they want to add are direct flights from RST to Orlando and from RST to Phoenix.

I think both of those are great ideas! They're very popular destinations, especially Orlando with Walt Disney World. Another interesting reason why these two destinations would be perfect was brought up at the meeting.

A representative of Volaire said that Orlando and Phoenix have a large group of people who used to live in Minnesota/the Rochester area. But they still have friends and family here. So either they would be flying here to visit or we'd be flying to them.

Either way, that's a win for RST. The same representative also mentioned an interesting stat: that "almost 60 percent of everyone on an airplane" is visiting friends or family. I suppose that makes sense! Most of my family lives within driving distance, though, so it's not something I've ever had to think about.

When Will Flights Begin to Orlando and Phoenix?

As of right now, there are no official plans to add the direct flights to and from Orlando and Phoenix. The meeting the other day was basically meant to inform. As KIMT wrote, it was "a 'Request for Action' item" in the meeting. Nothing was decided on, but this is something that RST really wants to do. And I think we'd all agree that it's a great idea.