JetBlue offers cozy coach at DIA.

• Author: CADA, CHRYSS
• Position: Airline service information - Brief Article

ON JETBLUE AIRWAYS NO ONE FLIES ON THE COMMONER'S SIDE OF THE CURTAIN.

That's because the newest airline to fly into Denver International Airport is all coach and no curtain. But with 24 channels of live satellite TV, and leather seats that are eight precious inches wider than standard, this isn't your common coach.

And while air travelers taking JetBlue's direct service to New York's Kennedy Airport may not feel like they're flying coach, their expense reports will.

This is where it really gets weird - JetBlue is a discount air carrier.

"A lot of people are responding to our approach," said Doug Barger, JetBlue's president and chief operating officer. "They want to feel like a person traveling in comfort, not livestock crammed in a cattle car."

Founded in February 1999 with the goal of "putting the humanity back into air travel, "the airline landed at DIA In mid-May. JetBlue files to 16 cities, primarily In Florida and the New York on the East Coast. Out West, JetBlue files to the Los Angeles area, San Francisco, Seattle, Salt Lake City and Denver.

Judging by Denver's embrace of the airline, Barger's estimation was right. At the end of June, JetBlue's only flight into the Mile High City, a red-eye that arrives at 11:40 p.m. and heads back to NYC an hour later, was running at 90 percent of capacity. Company officials estimate a daylight flight will be added before the end of the year.

Frequent business traveler Frank Fidnarick, who was catching Denver's JetBlue flight to New York on a recent Friday night, said the airline's biggest advantage is easy to discern. "I often buy tickets at the last minute, and JetBlue's price is usually the lowest," he said. "I called this morning and a ticket to New York would have cost $1,080 on United. My ticket on JetBlue was $256.25 including tax."

And Fidnarick's was actually the most expensive ticket JetBlue sells.

Including coast-to-coast travel, JetBlue's...