Standard&Poor's Ratings Services affirmed its 'A-' underlying rating (SPUR), with a stable outlook, on Austin, Texas's airport system revenue bonds. The SPUR reflects the airport's strong origin and destination market and solid enplanement trends, somewhat mitigated by high airline costs for a facility of this size. More specifically, the rating reflects the following factors: The airport has a strong origin and destination market (more than 90%) and good diversity of carriers, with Southwest, American, and Continental accounting for 74% of enplanements in 2007. There has been solid enplanement growth, with passenger traffic growing at an average annual rate of 4.5% during the past 10 years to reach 4.5 million enplaned passengers in 2007. Enplanements, however, were flat in
