The first time a paying passenger ever sits in a JetBlue first class seat, the plane will be pointed at Fort Lauderdale. The airline says its new BlueFirst cabin makes its debut on Tuesday, Dec. 8, on a flight from Boston to Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International, and the route list it published this week shows that FLL is not just the first stop. It is the center of the whole rollout.

What JetBlue announced

JetBlue put BlueFirst on sale on Thursday, Oct. 15. It is a domestic first class product, separate from Mint, the lie-flat business cabin the airline already flies on longer routes. BlueFirst is meant for the rest of the fleet, the planes that have carried only economy seating until now. JetBlue says the cabin will spread across those aircraft over time and reach more routes, including Latin America and the Caribbean.

The order of launch is what matters locally. After the Dec. 8 Boston flight, JetBlue says BlueFirst moves within days onto select flights between FLL and New York's LaGuardia, with its introductory fare window on that route opening Dec. 12. Both of the opening routes, in other words, are Fort Lauderdale routes.

Count the routes and FLL is half the map

The airline's published schedule lists 39 routes that will get BlueFirst between December and April. Nineteen of them touch Fort Lauderdale. Of the five December routes, every one runs to or from FLL: Boston, Buffalo, LaGuardia, Washington, D.C., and Liberia in Costa Rica.

January adds seven more from FLL: Aruba, Austin, Cartagena, Charlotte, Nashville, San José in Costa Rica, and San Juan. February brings Cancún, Dallas-Fort Worth, Hartford, New Orleans and Santo Domingo. March adds Medellín and Westchester County, the airport just north of New York City. By April, the newer launches shift toward Boston, but by then Fort Lauderdale fliers will already have had the cabin on most of the airline's busiest lines out of Broward.

JetBlue is careful to say that schedules can change and that BlueFirst may run only on select flights or dates at first, sometimes on and off, while planes are refitted. So the safe read is that the cabin is coming to these routes, not that every departure on them will have it right away. Check the seat map before you pay for it.

What you actually get in the seat

JetBlue's earlier announcement of the product lays out the hardware. BlueFirst is a dedicated cabin with seats in a two-by-two layout, so nobody is stuck in a middle seat. The seats recline five inches and offer up to seven more inches of legroom than JetBlue's standard Main seats. The cushions use a foam developed with the mattress company Tuft & Needle. Each seat has a 13.3-inch screen that pairs with Bluetooth headphones, plus USB-A, USB-C and regular 110-volt power.

Food depends on distance. On flights of 899 miles or more, BlueFirst passengers get a full meal JetBlue calls FirstFare, with an entrée, a side and dessert. Every BlueFirst flight, no matter how short, gets premium snacks. The drinks list includes wines picked by Parcelle, coffee from Cometeer and Joe Coffee, and teas from Smith Teamaker. The seatback screen also handles ordering, including a feature that lets you build your own cocktail from what is on board.

The ground side matters as much as the seat on a busy FLL morning. BlueFirst comes with Group 1 boarding, overhead bin space set aside for the cabin, priority check-in and priority bags, and faster security lines at more than 30 participating airports.

Three ways to buy it

Like the rest of JetBlue's cabins, BlueFirst is sold in tiers. BlueFirst Base is the cheapest: it includes one checked bag and a carry-on, free seat selection inside 24 hours of departure, and fees if you change or cancel. Standard BlueFirst includes two checked bags, free advance seat selection, and no change or cancellation fees. BlueFirst Flex adds refunds to your original form of payment if you cancel before departure, plus free same-day switches and standby.

The launch sale was short. JetBlue's introductory one-way fares started at $249 between LaGuardia and Fort Lauderdale and $299 between Boston and Fort Lauderdale, but they had to be booked by 11:59 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 16, and they blacked out the core holiday stretch from Dec. 17 to Jan. 4. Anyone booking now should expect regular pricing. Frequent fliers have another route in: at launch, JetBlue's Mosaic elite members on eligible fares can get free upgrades into BlueFirst before departure when seats are open.

Why Fort Lauderdale got it first

The choice is not random. In a separate release the same day, announcing a new daily nonstop from FLL to Cali, Colombia, JetBlue said it now runs more flights and more nonstop destinations from Fort Lauderdale than any other airline, and that it expects more than 150 daily departures there during the winter peak, its largest FLL schedule ever. Cali is JetBlue's fourth city in Colombia, joining Cartagena, Medellín and Barranquilla, and Columbus, Indianapolis and San Diego are next on the FLL list in November.

JetBlue describes Boston and Fort Lauderdale as two of its largest focus cities, which explains the pairing for the first flight. It also explains why so many of the early routes look like the ones Broward residents already fly every week: up to the Northeast to see family, over to Charlotte or Nashville for work, down to Aruba or San Juan for a long weekend.

What it means if you fly out of FLL

For years, the choice on a two- or three-hour JetBlue flight out of Fort Lauderdale was economy or economy with more legroom. Starting in December, there will be a real front cabin on the routes locals use most, and it shows up here before it shows up almost anywhere else. If you have a winter trip to Boston, New York or Washington on the calendar, look at the seat map when you book. The first row may be a new kind of seat, and you will be among the first people anywhere to try it.