Greenville-Spartanburg International Airport ranks in the top 10 airports in the United States for the least amount of delays.
The Greer airport ranked 7th with a delay time of 6 minutes, 50 seconds, not too terribly far off from the best — Kona, Hawaii Ellison Onizuka Kona International at Keahole at 5 minutes 35 seconds, according to data from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics.
Tiffany Cherry, communications manager for the Greenville-Spartanburg Airport District, said airports themselves don’t have a lot of oversight over delays; that’s an airline issue.
But she said factoring into that data is favorable weather conditions in Upstate South Carolina as well as flight scheduling and airfield capacity.
“Our region is less prone to severe weather events, such as snowstorms and tropical storms, which can significantly disrupt operations,” she said.
The airport, which like all airports, has been digging out from the flight disruptions during the COVID-19 pandemic, has seen some marked improvements, most especially in its revenues from $34..4 million in 2021 to $72.2 million expected for 2025.
The airport went after and saw a marked increase in cargo operations.
Also, the airport posted its highest number of passengers in May 2024 and expects to exceed 2.8 million passengers in 2024, a record, Cherry said.
The airport has also attracted attention from the Airports Council International’ s Airport Quality Program, which measures passenger satisfaction from arrival to departure at nearly 400 airports worldwide.
GSP was named best airport of 2 million to 5 million passengers in North America, most dedicated staff, easiest Journey, most enjoyable and cleanest airport.
“These awards are particularly meaningful because they are chosen by passengers themselves, reflecting the highest level of customer service recognition in the airport industry,” Cherry said.
The airport continues to face a challenge with what airport executives call passenger leakage, the number of people who go to a larger airport for their travel. In Greenville’s case that would be Atlanta or Charlotte.
About 40% of local passengers choose the larger airport, according to a study commissioned in March 2023, based on CY2022 data, which is about average for smaller airports.
Airport leadership has been single minded in pursuing new destinations and airlines. Since that study was conducted, 11 new destinations and two new airlines, Breeze and Avelo, have been added.
New destinations are Manchester, New Hampshire; New Haven, Connecticut; Rochester, New York, serviced by Avelo and Los Angeles; Providence, Rhode IslandI Orlando Tampa and Hartford, Connecticut services by Breeze.
Longtime airlines have added destinations as well. Southwest flies to Nashville, American to New York-LaGuardia and United Washington-Dulles.
The other airports in the top 10 with least delays found by transportation data studied by SellMyTimeshareNow.com , are:
- Piedmont Triad International 5 minutes and 47 seconds
- Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport 6 minutes and 11 seconds
- Portland Oregon International Airport and Hawaii’s Lihue Airport with an average delay of 6 minutes and 16 seconds
- Boise Air Terminal 6 minutes and 24 seconds
- Spokane International 6 minutes and 42 seconds
- Norman Y. Mineta San Jose International Airport in California 6 minutes and 55 seconds
- Pittsburgh International 7 minutes and 36 seconds
- Tucson International 7 minutes and 43 seconds
The worst delays were seen at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport at 22 minutes and 54 seconds.
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