Philadelphia’s top tourism official was in Sydney, on a tour urging visits by Australians and New Zealanders, when he learned that American Airlines will add three new transatlantic routes at PHL next summer.
It was Aug. 17th when American announced 2024 plans to fly Philadelphia transatlantic to Copenhagen, Nice and Naples next summer. “The most striking part was that this was the addition of three new routes in one fell swoop,” said Gregg Caren, CEO of the Philadelphia Convention and Visitors Bureau. “During the pandemic we were thrilled to get one new route back, so to get three at one time is a big deal and a sign of more to come.”
Caren wouldn’t say whether he know of more planned destinations, but he noted, “As the aircraft industry catches up with deliveries, I’m looking for more doubles and triples rather than singles.” As he made his case for more visitors, he included the hub expansion. “We quickly added that to our talking points,” he said.
The talking points already included walkable city full of history, art, restaurants, and sports, augmented by events leading up to the 250th anniversary, or “semiquincentennial,” on July 4, 2026. On July 4th, 1776, which was 250 years earlier, the Second Continental Congress met in Philadelphia and adopted the Declaration of Independence, separating the 13 U.S. colonies from Great Britain.
It is not clear exactly how Philadelphia will celebrate, but it is likely that many tourists will choose to visit. Besides the celebration, Philadelphia is one of the 16 North American cities chosen to host 2026 World Cup soccer games. It will also host the 2026 Major League Baseball All-Star game.
By then, American Airlines’ Philadelphia hub should have fully recovered from its dramatic pandemic downsizing. This summer, the hub has just 265 peak daily summer departures from Philadelphia, down from 410 in 2019. However, in recent weeks American has been rebuilding. The May rejection of the American/JetBlue Northeast Alliance by a U.S. District Court judge in Boston disadvantaged New York airline passengers and JetBlue, but it benefited PHL. This month, American announced the three new transatlantic destinations; the resumption of PHL-Doha flights, replacing OneWorld partner Qatar Airlines on the route, and new PHL flights to San Antonio and New York LaGuardia.
Brian Znotins, American senior director of network planning, said in a video presentation that the hub makes Philadelphia preferable to JFK for flights to cities like Copenhagen. “In Philadelphia we have the opportunity to bring in 40 flights domestically at the same time and they all connect to Copenhagen,” he said. By contrast, at JFK, due to gate and slot limitations, “you can only bring eight or nine flights in.” For destinations such as Delhi and Tel Aviv, local New York traffic can fill a widebody aircraft, but for niche destinations like Copenhagen, Naples and Nice, “It’s better to be in Philadelphia,” where American has its best transatlantic hub.
Like the hub, Philadelphia tourism suffered a pandemic decline. According to CVB
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For his trip down under, Caren joined tourism officials from Boston and Washington, D.C. They made the case that if tourists from Australia and New Zealand visit New York, they should visit nearby cities as well. They met with tourism executives, travel suppliers, tour operators, and reporters to promote their regions. The visit was triggered, Caren said, by Qantas’ June launch of Sydney-Auckland-New York flights, three times weekly aboard a Boeing 787-9 with 236 seats. The schedule goes to four weekly in October.
“For many years, visitors from Australia and down under had to visit the United States through the West Coast,” Caren said. Now they can fly to New York. Given that tourists from Australia and New Zealand put together long trips of two to four weeks, it is reasonable to think they will visit other nearby cities, he said.
Looking ahead to 2026, the plan is for hundreds of thousands of overseas visitors to arrive while hundreds of thousands of American Airlines passengers depart for Europe.
Philadelphia’s role in U.S. history is obvious, as is the symbolism of Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell, but “People have no idea how much more depth there is,” Caren said. For instance, in the famous 1976 film, Rocky climbed 72 stone steps at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. According to Wikipedia, “Tourists often mimic Rocky’s famous climb, a metaphor for an underdog or an everyman rising to a challenge.” For Philadelphia, while the metaphor may be a tired one, it nevertheless seems headed for revival.
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