How Do Illinois Airports Rate For Cheap Airfares?

Fact Checked by Jim Tomlin

The experience of anyone who has traveled by air lately is that commercial flying is enjoying a tremendous rebound from the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic. And the numbers confirm that.

So at IllinoisBet.com, we paused our Illinois sports betting coverage to delve into the topic further.

The Bureau of Transportation Statistics reports that passengers for December 2022 were 74.9 million, not far off the pre-pandemic December 2019 figure of 79.5 million passengers.

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Airfares Volatile All Over

Meanwhile, air travelers have seen airfares increase, and more recently decrease. Customer demand and fuel prices have been among the factors contributing to the volatility of air travel costs.

Using data from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, IlinoisBet.com ranked the states and the District of Columbia based on approximate average domestic airline itinerary fares by origin city for 2022 and the first quarter of 2023. The Bureau of Transportation’s airfares are reported based on individual cities, and obviously the cities within a given state are of varying sizes. We averaged the fares by city, then arranged them by state, to arrive at our numbers.

Cheapest States For Flying

Rank State Avg. Fare ($)
1 DE 139.245
2 NJ 238.195
3 CT 272.265
4 SD 315.15
5 OH 326.92
6 NH 355.985
7 FL 358.575
8 RI 360.565
9 CA 362.7
10 NY 372.375
11 MD 387.39
12 UT 390.72
13 IL 394.24
14 KY 397.03
15 SC 418.84
16 NV 421.3
17 DC 438.195
18 WA 438.36
19 PA 438.735
20 IA 438.78
21 MA 446.035
22 NC 449.675
23 MO 450.08
24 IN 450.39
25 WV 454.235
26 VT 458.44
27 HI 459.84
28 TN 469.455
29 OK 470.185
30 AZ 473.65
31 OR 475.22
32 TX 480.365
33 ME 483.09
34 KS 490.8
35 VA 491.47
36 NE 497.845
37 NM 504.39
38 MS 509.34
39 CO 515.085
40 MI 515.44
41 WI 522.45
42 MN 522.76
43 MT 528.605
44 GA 529.315
45 ND 534.745
46 LA 537.815
47 AR 542.76
48 AL 570.91
49 ID 582.275
50 WY 598.86
51 AK 655.85

Illinois Toward Top Of Pack

Given those parameters, IllinoisBet.com – your source for  Illinois sportsbook promos – calculated that Illinois was ranked No. 13 in lowest airfare among the 50 states and D.C., for the span we examined.  Illinois’ average fare was $394.24 over all of 2022 and the first quarter of 2023 (January through March).

The state with the lowest approximate average airfare for the period measured was Delaware. The lone airport in the state that is measured by the Bureau of Transportation Statistics is in Wilmington, where the average fare was $139.25. 

The most expensive state was the one with the most-far flung airports compared to most of America – that’s Alaska, with an approximate average rate of $655.85 per flight per city measured.

The BTS website included 12 cities in Illinois for the purpose of airfare statistics. They are, in order of 2022 passenger volume: Chicago-O’Hare (airport code ORD), Chicago-Midway (MDW), Peoria (PIA), Molne (MLI). Belleville (BLV), Bloomington/Normal (BMI), Rockford (RFD), Springfield (SPI), Champaign/Urbana (CMI), Decatur (DEC), Marion/Herrin (MWA), and Quincy (UIN).

O’Hare had the second-highest passenger volume in the country in 2022, according to the official stats, behind only LAX in Los Angeles.

IllinoisBet.com has reviews of Illinois betting apps that you seek, plus lifestyle stories such as this one.

Author

Bill Ordine

Bill Ordine covers state gambling issues for IllinoisBet.com. He was a reporter and editor in news and sports for the Philadelphia Inquirer and Baltimore Sun for 25 years, and was a lead reporter on a team that was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Breaking News. Bill started reporting on casinos and gaming shortly after Atlantic City’s first gambling halls opened and wrote a syndicated column on travel to casino destinations for 10 years.

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