Article Last Updated: Friday, December 30, 2005 - 5:04:23 PM EST
Highway in the Air
By Jessica Wakeman
[email protected]
Need to be in the boardroom on Wall Street pronto? Soon you'll be able to get there in 17 minutes flat - but it'll cost you $175 each way. US Helicopter, a new air commuter service, can transport up to nine area businessmen at a time from Sikorsky Airport to the Wall Street heliport, located at Pier Six on the East River. The helicopters now being painted - will be up and hovering in February at the price of $175 per person per flight. Reservations are likely to begin in January.
For many who work in Manhattan, Fairfield and surrounding towns are perfect "bedroom communities." Perfect ex-cept for the morning and evening commutes: lack of parking for the Metro North train ride or Mr. Toad's Wild Ride of Interstate 95. But the average commuter will not fly to work in the air, said Fairfield resident John Capozzi, a company investor and member of its board of directors. Rather, US Helicopter will serve "high senior executives who have a time problem," he explained.
The service is intended to be an alternative for the type of businessman "who takes a black car" into Manhattan, said Donal McSullivan, senior vice president and chief marketing officer. Capozzi, who owns a limousine company, said clients pay about $200 each way for a two-hour-20-minute ride into Manhattan. "Literally hundreds of executives take limos every day," said Capozzi. Trading fender benders for airsickness, the execs can reduce their commute to less than 20 minutes.
"What we do is give people back their time," McSullivan explained, adding that a 17-minute-long daily helicopter ride with eight other execs is a "fabulous networking situation." The commute via helicopter will be long enough to drink a coffee or read The Wall Street Journal, he said. In groups of nine, passengers can fly into Manhattan and back on a two-engine helicopter flown by two pilots. Equipped with GPS, the Sikorsky S76 helicopters will commute Monday through Friday, morning and night. The company has a fleet of helicopters, and the number of possible flights will depend on how many people are interested in the service, said Capozzi.
But the seats are not up for grabs on a day-to-day basis, said McSullivan. Rather, the company is hoping clients will purchase a seat in the helicopter for a duration of time. When asked how the gas mileage of helicopters versus town cars compared, Capozzi said he did not know. "We're not selling gas savings," he said. What the people at US Helicopter are selling is what they believe to be the first helicopter commute from Fairfield County to Manhattan, said McSullivan.
Additionally, US Helicopter will provide eight-minute-long flights from the Wall Street heliport to area airports, with an introductory price of $139 each way. Helicopters will leave hourly between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. from Manhattan to the airports. Beginning in February, the aircraft will fly to John F. Kennedy International Airport; by April, service will be extended to LaGuardia International Airport. Also in April, the East 34th Street heliport will become part of the service network. The company has partnered with American Airlines, acquiring use of its terminals at JFK. The security clearances will be another perk, said Capozzi.
"The big news is we will clear security at the airport," he said. Instead of heading into the terminal to join a line with the other flight passengers for security, the Transportation Safety Administration will perform security checks for the Sikorsky S76 passengers after they disembark the helicopter. Though the commute from Fairfield County to Manhattan is a new idea, companies in the past tried Manhattan-to-airport helicopter commutes before, Capozzi and McSullivan said. In the 1970s and early 1980s, airlines Pan Am and New York Airways attempted Manhattan-to-airport commutes.
But those helicopter services failed because the aircraft needed more maintenance than is required today and customers did not take to the service, said McSullivan. But now, "the market size has increased by threefold," said McSullivan, adding that US Helicopter performed prior market research. That research also indicated that speedy helicopter commutes from Manhattan to the Hamptons, Nantucket or Martha's Vineyard might be a possibility in the summertime, he said. "We have used the mistakes of others and have been very careful," said McSullivan.
With investors, Capozzi and McSullivan put $16 million into the venture in the five years that the two men have been ironing out the details. They secured former Sikorsky chairman and former Fairfield resident Dean Borgman as chairman of US Helicopter, and Jerry Murphy, former head of Pan Am Shuttle, will be the chief executive officer. Helicopters are safe for travel, said both men. The Sikorsky S76 aircrafts are "the same helicopters the Coast Guard flies into hurricanes," Capozzi said.
For more information, visit
http://www.flyush.com.
