PITTSTON TWP. — Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport travelers can soon use a mobile app to track and book flights and check parking availability.
The FlyAVP app — named partly after the airport’s three-letter federal designation — automatically will pull information from the airport’s upgraded website, FlyAVP.com.
“If we change any information (on the website), any alert messages or anything like that, it will automatically transfer to the app,” said Brock Siegel, chief executive officer for Omnitized, the app’s Wilkes-Barre-based developer.
Siegel spoke at an airport board meeting Thursday.
The airport hired Omnitized for $30,954 to develop the app and the upgraded website, which went online Sept. 23, airport spokesman Eric McKitish said. Siegel hopes to have the app available by next week. Google Play and Apple’s App Store will have it available for download, McKitish said. Siegel said he’s also building a webpage for downloading.
An app allows continuous communication with users, Siegel said.
“We can send messages that show up on home screens of the smart device if there is an urgent weather alert for travelers, congestion on the highways ... parking lot capacities, (flight) delays, cancellations, etc,” Siegel said. “We can also ... promote the newest programs that we have to offer.”
The website’s key new feature shows the availability of parking in the garage and three lots, along with prices for both. With the airport’s increased use, the garage sometimes fills up. That feature will make the app especially handy.
“We are really excited about that,” airport Director Carl Beardsley Jr. said.
Siegel said he could not find airports in other small- to medium-sized markets that offer a mobile app.
“I think this is going to put us in a whole different league when it comes to standing out,” he said.
The website and app will also communicate directly with the airport’s loyalty customers. As of Oct. 31, 538 people signed up for the loyalty program, about three-quarters from Luzerne and Lackawanna counties, according to a chart presented at the meeting.
In other business, the board:
Extended Beardsley’s current three-year contract until Jan. 1, 2022, and declared Thursday as Carl Beardsley Day in Luzerne and Lackawanna counties. Both honor and reward Beardsley’s airport leadership and two years as president of the Aviation Council of Pennsylvania, which represents airports across the state. Beardsley, who started as director in January 2015 and whose salary is $125,640, is due at least 2% raises in 2020 and 2021, according to his contract. The airport broke a passenger departure record in 2017, came close in 2016 and 2018, and is on pace to set another record this year.
“He’s done a fabulous job,” said Patrick O’Malley, an airport board member and Lackawanna County commissioner.
Unveiled a plaque honoring Peter Payavis, the superintendent who died in August and worked for the airport for 41 years. Payavis’ wife, Joyce, and their daughter, Melissa, pulled away a “Terrible Towel,” waved by Pittsburgh Steelers fans like Payavis, to unveil the plaque.
Melissa Payavis teared up remembering her father, who loved talking about his job.
If they visited the Tipsy Turtle, a nearby restaurant, a lap around the airport inevitably followed, she said.
“It was always evident that he loved to come to the airport every day,” Payavis said.
Most of the airport’s operations staff, who Payavis supervised, showed up for the unveiling.
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