Find out where Southwest Airlines will fly at Long Beach Airport

Southwest Airlines will begin daily flights out of Long Beach Airport on June 5, flying initially to Oakland Inteational, officials said Thursday moing.

An introductory one-way ticket price for Southwest’s LGB to Oakland will be $49, said Southwest executive Andrew Watterson at a press conference at the Queen Mary.

Southwest Airlines aounced in February that it had an interest in serving LGB, and the airport offered four newly-available “slots” to the airline.

It was a smaller number than what Southwest wanted. Airline executives had asked for all nine of the new slots, but this week officials confirmed they plan to begin flying out of Long Beach by the summer.

Southwest now has a presence at 10 Califoia airports, which include Los Angeles Inteational Airport, John Wayne and Ontario Inteational airports.

The possibility of Southwest coming to LGB follows Airport Director Bryant Francis’ determination that the combination of improvements in passenger jet technology resulting in airlines being able to use quieter aircraft and the mandates of Long Beach’s law goveing airport noise requires the city to increase the number of flight operations allowed at LGB.

Previously, the city’s noise law has set forth a base line number of 41 commercial flights at LGB. Long Beach’s noise law is written to limit aircraft noise levels, as opposed to the number of flight operations, and basically sets a budget for maximum allowable noise levels.

Francis advised the council that studies show LGB must give airlines a chance to provide more flights at the airport since existing carriers have been operating below the allowable noise level.

LGB officials have also offered three slots to JetBlue Airways Corp. and two slots to Delta Air Lines. JetBlue and Delta currently offer flights at LGB, with the former being the airport’s primary carrier.

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