Morning departures from the Dubuque Regional Airport will soon be an option for business and leisure travelers in the Dubuque region. The announcement was made at an air service forum hosted by the Dubuque Area Chamber of Commerce on Friday, Feb. 28.

A start date and flight schedule are not yet finalized, but Denver Air Connection (DAC) plans to shift some of its daily flights between Dubuque and O’Hare International Airport from afternoon to morning departures two or three days per week.

The morning flight options are being offered as a result of ongoing conversations with Denver Air Connection, which began daily service to Chicago from Dubuque in November. The current afternoon-only flight schedule was the only option available when service began.

“Since we restarted daily flights to O’Hare three months ago, we have consistently heard requests from business and leisure travelers asking for a morning flight,” says Dubuque Mayor Brad Cavanagh, who also chairs the board of DBQ Air, a non-profit organization dedicated to recruiting and retaining air service. “I couldn’t be more excited and thankful that Denver Air Connection is responding to these requests so quickly to make daily air service even more convenient from our Dubuque Regional Airport.”

Additional details about the flight schedule change are still being finalized, including when the morning flights will be available for booking, but will be shared when available. A Denver Air Connection executive who spoke at the forum also mentioned the airline is considering offering direct flights from Dubuque to Denver in the future.

Denver Air Connection’s flights to and from Chicago represented a return to daily commercial air service for the Dubuque Regional Airport slightly more than two years after American Airlines discontinued service.

“This is a fight worth fighting,” Cavanagh said. “If we want our community to merely stay the same, or even shrink, then we don’t need flights. But if we want our economy to grow and our community to improve, we need flights at our airport. Here is the very good news. Our fate is in our hands. If we fly out of our airport, we can keep the flights we have and increase the number of flights we get.”

Passengers can utilize Denver Air’s baggage and ticketing agreements with American and United Airlines to make same-day connections to hundreds of destinations. The shift to morning flights will only increase the number of available connections. Tickets can be purchased directly through American, United, DAC, or a preferred online travel retailer/agency. Base fares for flights between Dubuque and Chicago were recently reduced to $69 one-way.

Additional details about the overall state of the air travel industry were also shared by an air service consultant at the forum. One point mentioned was that business travel has been slower to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic than leisure travel. It was also noted that, among airports that lost service since the pandemic, Dubuque has recovered a larger share of flight capacity at a quicker rate than others.