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Virgin America makes debut at Washington Reagan National
August 16, 2012

Virgin America made its debut at Washington's Reagan National Airport (DCA), inaugurating nonstop round-trip service to San Francisco. The carrier's one daily round-trip is currently its only presence at the slot-restricted airport.

The carrier won the rights for the new long-distance routes this past spring, part of legislation by Congress to expand long-haul flying from Washington's close-to-downtown airport.

Virgin America's San Francisco route will go head-to-head against United, which was allowed by the same legislation to convert one of its existing flights at the airport to one that exceeds the 1,250-mile "perimeter" that restricts all but 20 daily round-trip flights at the airport.

United's San Francisco-DCA service – also one daily round-trip flight - began May 14. Prior to that, San Francisco had been the largest U.S. market without nonstop service from DCA.

As for Virgin America, it took a patriotic tack on its new service to the nation's capital, hiring "Barack" and "Mitt" impersonators to entertain fliers on its inaugural flight to Washington National.

The carrier also used the D.C. route to announce a partnership with Rock the Vote that will allow passengers to register to vote while aboard Virgin America flights.

Fliers on Virgin America will be able to use their smartphones to scan a QR code on the airline's seatback entertainment system to register to vote. Virgin America notes that Rock the Vote is "the largest non-partisan voter registration organization in the country."

"We the people get to decide who will be flying to D.C. next year as our representatives, but no matter who you are voting for this November, you have to be registered first," Heather Smith, president of Rock the Vote, says in a release touting the launch of Virgin America's DCA route.

"Rock the Vote is thrilled to bring voter registration to Virgin America's guests as well as the opportunity to make a donation to support our efforts to register 1.5 million new voters and educate young Americans about participating in our democracy."

Source :- http://travel.usatoday.com/flights/