Bradley Reaches Out to the Riches of Fairfield County

Living and traveling out of the Pioneer Valley of Massachusetts is a pleasure. That’s because we can usually fly from Hartford/Springfield’s Bradley International Airport. Today the Associated Press reports that this relatively small airport is making a big pitch to capture more business in the wealthy enclave of Fairfield county, Connecticut.

“On July 1, Northwest Airlines will introduce daily nonstop service from Bradley to Amsterdam in the Netherlands, where the U.S. carrier and its Dutch airline partner KLM have a hub with connections to other European cities, Africa and India.

Bradley’s marketing campaign is headed by Greenwich resident L. Scott Frantz who said that despite the proximity of his house to New York, he recently had to leave four hours before his flight at Newark Liberty International Airport because of highway gridlock and long check-in lines.

And New York’s other two airports weren’t much better, he said. “My experience going to Kennedy and LaGuardia, it’s typically a zoo,” Frantz said. “You compare that to going to Bradley, it’s like night and day.”

Bradley, which is nearly 100 miles from Greenwich, is more distant than New York airports for travelers in Fairfield County. But the state-owned airport in Windsor Locks offers ample parking, shorter security lines and easier highway access, Frantz said.