SkyWest Airlines (OO, Salt Lake City) has won a US Department of Transportation (DoT) Essential Air Service contract to operate 12x weekly Pueblo to Denver International flights effective from February 1, 2014, through to January 31, 2016. According to the DoT, while the USD1'549'558 bid of incumbent, Great Lakes Airlines (Cheyenne), to operate the service using a 19-seat Beech 1900D had come in lower than that of Skywest, which had bid USD1'737'732 and will use an E120, it chose the latter given Skywest's other reliable EAS services and its cooperation agreement with United Airlines (UA, Chicago O'Hare) at Denver which would allow "passengers to seamlessly connect to the national and global air transportation network."