Transborder Demand Falls, Cuts at YLW

As airlines continue to adjust summer schedules based on Canadian travellers opting to avoid the U.S. in ever-increasing numbers, a few more transborder routes have been cut. The latest route chopped is the daily WestJet flight between Kelowna International (YLW) and Seattle-Tacoma (SEA). The flight has only been suspended for the month of April at this point and is anticipated to resume in May, according to Kelowna local news. Alaska Airlines continues to operate a daily flight between the two airports. 

Transborder traffic from Kelowna took another hit when WestJet ended its seasonal flight to Las Vegas three weeks early.

The suspended routes are part of the larger trend of diminished lift between Canada and the United States. Earlier this week at its annual meeting, Air Canada stated that transborder bookings were down 10% for the April-to-September period compared with the same period last year. Air Canada focuses on staying “agile,” Chairman Vagn Sørensen said in the meeting, in order to maintain enough flexibility to redeploy capacity in response to demand shifts. 

Data cruncher Visual Approach reported on the mounting pullback from the U.S. by Canadians, indicating leisure markets are bearing the brunt of the cuts, particularly Florida, showing seats to Fort Myers and Palm Beach down 30 percent and 43 percent, respectively, compared to April schedules as they existed on January 1, 2025. By comparison, Newark, Boston and San Francisco were down only slightly or remained the same.

Hawaii flights were a notable exception to the trend, with no changes reported from what was scheduled at the start of the year.

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