Dulles International Airport's reputation as a low-fare mecca continued to grow this week as upstart Independence Air announced new service with bargain fares to five West Coast cities, beginning this spring, and United Airlines quickly matched those fares on selected flights.
The result is that local leisure and business travelers should have more choices and markedly lower fares on flights from Dulles to San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Jose and Seattle.
Say you're thinking about taking a quick trip to San Diego, leaving May 1 and returning May 3. As recently as Monday afternoon, United was charging $1,212 for nonstop flights from Dulles on those dates.
But after studying Independence Air's announcement Monday morning that it would offer introductory $188 round-trip fares -- that's $84 each way, plus taxes -- to its five newest destinations, United matched Independence's fares dollar for dollar Monday night.
Within hours, United's fare had tumbled 84.5 percent.
Wall Street analysts had predicted that competitors would match Independence's ticket prices on the West Coast routes.
"I fully expect United to be aggressively competitive against them in those markets," Betsy R. Snyder of Standard & Poor's said late last week.
Kerry B. Skeen, chairman of Flyi Inc., parent company of Independence Air, had also predicted a swift reaction by the major carriers.
"When you go head to head with anyone, it's pretty standard in the industry that the fares are matched," he said.
Skeen's financially troubled, 7 1/2-month-old airline plans to roll out the West Coast service -- on new 132-seat Airbus A319 jets -- on April 14 to San Diego and on May 1 to Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose and Seattle.
