The number of new flights taking off at the Peoria airport is scary-good. In one year, the airport has doubled its number of destinations.

Phoenix, Arizona, is Allegiant Air's newest destination out of Peoria. The flight takes off twice a week on Wednesday and Saturday and travelers are taking notice.

Jerry Norgart flew to Peoria from Phoenix and said, "You don't have to change planes. You don't lose your luggage. It's a direct flight. It's a lot faster. You don't have to wait around the airport and spend a lot of money."

Annette Swanson added, "I told everyone my prices to fly out of Phoenix, I mean Peoria and they could not believe the prices. They're great."

A record of 401,000 passengers have boarded planes in Peoria so far this year. The airport director says with Orlando flights starting in November and Ft. Lauderdale in December, Peoria's airport is flying high.

Ken Spirito said, "We have 11 destinations but if the true market uses the services we have today, we'll be able to get more non-stop destinations. We could go to the east and pick up more frequencies to the existing services."

With these new destinations comes a new demographic of travelers. The Greater Peoria Regional Airport now reaches a much wider range of customers.

"We are attracting people from an hour and a half to two hours away around the Peoria area. We're drawing from Decatur, from Springfield, from Bloomington, from Peru, LaSalle and even in Moline," said Spirito.

It shows as Peoria's planes are taking off cross-country to more cities than any other Illinois airport outside Chicago. Moline has Memphis and Spirito says that's now a possibility for Peoria.

"It's very important that we try and use Peoria as much as possible to keep these destinations. If we fly them and use them, we'll have more," said Spirito.

It's the new destination and a fair price that drew Joe and Clarice Chism of Mesa, Arizona to visit friends in Springfield.

Joe said, "It's our first trip here. It's a real nice airport. We love it. Before we would fly into Chicago or Indianapolis and we drive over."

Leaders at Bloomington's Airport also report they're on pace to break passenger records. That airport is also looking to head west with a possible stop in Denver or Salt Lake City after Air Tran just added Las Vegas in August.