Hawaiian Airlines is creating a Maui hub that will increase service between the Valley Isle and other neighbor islands by 25 percent and improve connections to and from the West Coast.

The Honolulu-based carrier said Thursday it is boosting its daily neighbor island schedule by an additional 23 to 25 flights through the next several weeks using three Boeing 717-200 jets it recently leased from Boeing Capital. More than half of the added flights will serve the new Maui hub with one-third of those providing additional nonstop service between Maui and both Hawaii island and Kauai.

"Hopefully, this will make everyone in the islands happy," Hawaiian President and CEO Mark Dunkerley said by phone from Maui. "This clearly brings greater focus on Maui, helps us build flights on Maui and gets us well situated to compete on Maui. For other neighbor islands, it gives them connectivity to Maui. It gives the other neighbor islands the ability to do a round trip without connecting in Honolulu, and it means a great deal for them."

Dunkerley said the new Maui hub also will help manage the flow of traffic in Honolulu.

Daily service between Maui and other islands will increase to 36 round-trip flights from 29 on peak travel days, which are Friday through Sunday, and to 34 round-trip flights from 27 on off-peak days. Hawaiian is also adding daily flights between Honolulu and Kauai, Hilo and Kona during peak periods.

Beginning March 11, Hawaiian will initiate two daily round-trip flights between Maui and Kauai. The arline also will expand Maui-Kona flights to three daily round trips from two, and expand Maui-Hilo flights to two daily round trips from one.

Overall, the airline will increase its interisland service to 180 flights daily from 157 flights on peak travel days, and to 168 flights from 143 flights on off-peak days.

Local aviation historian Peter Forman called the Maui expansion "very positive."

"With more flights originating in Maui and spreading out to the other islands, there’s going to be more incentive for Hawaiian to add direct flights to Maui from distant destinations," Forman said. "Therefore, the residents of Maui are going to see more direct flights in the long run to other locations."

Dunkerley said the company has about 300 employees on Maui and is still "working through the numbers" on how many more employees it will need for the new hub. However, he said Hawaiian will increase its overall work force by between 500 and 600 this year and will end 2012 with a company-record 4,750 employees.

"Clearly, with an enormous investment like the one we announced today, what we want to see if it is financially successful and lead to further investments," he said. "Our medium- and long-term view is if we can get the right airport facility to operate efficiently on Maui, if we fill our airplanes and if we can operate our services on a financially viable basis, we’ll be eager to see additional flights to Maui."

If the Maui hub is successful, it will give Hawaiian a good template to look at some of the other neighbor islands to see what’s possible, said Dunkerley.

Hawaiian is also restarting daily nonstop service between Maui and Los Angeles from June 21 through Aug. 18 on its 264-seat Boeing 767-300ER. The flights will depart Los Angeles International Airport at 9:40 a.m. and arrive at Kahului Airport at 12:15 p.m. The return flight will leave Maui at 1:45 p.m. and arrive in Los Angeles at 10:05 p.m.

Hawaiian also flies nonstop to Maui from Seattle; Las Vegas; Oakland, Calif.; and San Jose, Calif.

The airline is changing the arrival time of the twice-weekly nonstop flights to Maui from Las Vegas to morning from evening to allow Hawaii island residents to make flight connections on its new direct flights to Hilo and Kona. It is also adjusting other neighbor island flight schedules to increase connectivity with its direct mainland flights to and from Maui.

"Hawaiian’s expansion plan for Kahului Airport is good news for neighbor island residents and will make air travel between our islands easier while also increasing opportunities to showcase Maui as a visitor destination," said state Sen. J. Kalani English (D, East Maui-Lanai-Molokai), chairman of the Senate Transportation and International Affairs Committee.