Officials from the Orlando-Melbourne Airport are gearing up for direct flights from Windsor to the Florida location next month.
Porter Airlines starts once-a-week flights to the smaller airport December 16.
Lori Booker is Communications Director for the airport and is touring Windsor's facility and making sure all the details are in place. She says people may not be familiar with their airport, which is closer to the Atlantic coast and Port Canaveral than the main Orlando airport:
"We have Disney, Carnival, Norwegian, Royal Caribbean and more 20 minutes from our airport. We are the closest airport to Port Canaveral. We are also the closest airport to NASA," says Booker.
Orlando - Melbourne Airport Communications Director Lori Booker (by AM800's Peter Langille)
She says people looking for a less stressful entry into Florida will want to look at the Porter option.
"Porter is our first international carrier," says Booker. "We've been kind of the step-child to the Orlando airport until the Orlando Airport got so big that airlines started looking for an alternative way to come in and not have people go through the hassles of the big airport."
It's not just airlines that will enjoy the lack of congestion.
Booker says getting through customs is a breeze at Orlando-Melbourne.
"Thanks to the Porter connections and other things that are going on we just completely renovated our Customs building, it's now the fastest and most technologically advanced entry into the US," says Booker. "We timed our last Porter flight and the people got through Customs in 12 minutes."
Booker is confident Porter will grow their service from Windsor to Florida after this first season.
A one-way flight from Windsor to Orlando-Melbourne is just under $250 CAD.