Interesting that they are re-fitting the 717 s even though they do not intend to keep them for the l

While I was off, Southwest made a couple of interesting moves worth talking about. By far the most interesting to me was a decision on which AirTran markets stay in the system and which ones disappear. (You can also see full schedule changes for the summer.) Instead of leaking it out in dribs and drabs, a tactic for which I chastised them previously , this time they put a big lump announcement together.
When I wrote about the last route announcement which axed more small cities, I listed 8 AirTran cities enterprise rental car phoenix airport which I thought should have been concerned about their future. Looks like I was about half right. Here s a map with all the cities that won t make the cut.
The ones that will be going are Allentown (PA), Harrisburg enterprise rental car phoenix airport (PA), Huntsville (AL), Lexington (KY), Sarasota (FL), and Westchester County (NY). The first four were on my list, and I had no doubt at all about Huntsville and Lexington. Allentown and Harrisburg were a mild surprise: I thought one would stick around, especially since Southwest has been getting its clock cleaned in Philly. I figured one of those cities might be a good add to the network, but I didn t expect to see both. But it s the last two cities enterprise rental car phoenix airport that caught my eye.
Sarasota and Westchester were bigger surprises. Sarasota is a highly seasonal market, so maybe Southwest couldn t find a way to properly serve it year-round, but I imagine it s a good market in the winter. It is just 50 miles south of Tampa, so I suppose Southwest can leave it to airlines that are better capable of serving the market.
In Westchester, AirTran only has five flights a day there with two to Atlanta, one to Orlando, and one on the blue hair express down to West Palm Beach. Southwest wouldn t be able to get more slots there, so it would be tough to run a Southwest-style operation. The model is further challenged by the fact that the airport handles all customer enterprise rental car phoenix airport service, enterprise rental car phoenix airport so Southwest couldn t have its own people. (Southwest says that s not why the airline backed out, but it had to be a factor.) enterprise rental car phoenix airport Other airlines will be more than happy to snap up those slots in what is a strong market serving a very rich clientele.
But what about the cities that are staying? That s an interesting enterprise rental car phoenix airport story. I said Branson (MO), Pensacola (FL), Portland (ME), and Rochester (NY) should be concerned, but they made the cut. I shouldn t have been surprised by Branson since Southwest already announced AirTran would start Baltimore flights from there. I m sure Southwest is getting a hefty subsidy, clearly showing this isn t your father s Southwest that only flew to markets that worked enterprise rental car phoenix airport on their own. (The same goes for Wichita, which will be keeping service thanks to continuing what appears to be a perpetual subsidy.)
Pensacola enterprise rental car phoenix airport surprised me because when it started Panama City service , Southwest agreed to pay a penalty if it started to serve Pensacola because of its proximity. Could the market be so good that it s worth paying the penalty? Or maybe Southwest renegotiated that deal?
What else is staying? Well, there are the obvious ones. Akron-Canton (OH), Des Moines, Washington/National, and most of the international enterprise rental car phoenix airport cities are sticking around. Southwest has already made it clear that these would be staying through various previous route announcements.
Then there are the mid-size cities that Southwest enterprise rental car phoenix airport has previously avoided. Charlotte and Memphis are the most notable here. Southwest should serve these cities, though I don t expect an enormous operation at either, at least not at this point.
That leaves us with Flint (MI), Dayton (OH), Richmond (VA), Key West (FL), and Grand Rapids (MI). These are a mixed bag. Dayton seems to be the closest Southwest wants to get to Cincinnati for now. Grand Rapids and Richmond are decent-sized places enterprise rental car phoenix airport that might generate enough demand for a small operation. Flint and Key West are head-scratchers, however.
Flint isn t very far from Detroit and it s not exactly an economic powerhouse. Seems like a stretch to me. And Key West . . . if Sarasota can t survive then I m surprised Key West can. These just seem like markets that can barely sustain a minimum level of Southwest service, at best.
And that leads us back to the other big issue recently . . . Southwest and its seating. Last week, Southwest made a big deal about how it was putting new seating into its airplanes . It hailed the change as a new era of customer enterprise rental car phoenix airport comfort and sustainability. There s even a name for this change EVOLVE and yes, it s written in all-caps. Give me a break.
I haven t had the chance to try these seats, but they are thinner, and they use more environmentally-friendly material. They will, however, enterprise rental car phoenix airport also recline less than the existing seats, and they ll be moved closer together enough to allow another row to be added to the airplanes. I have to reserve enterprise rental car phoenix airport judgment on these since I haven t sat in them to see if they truly are comfortable or not, but the way that Southwest is promoting this as the greatest thing since slice bread certainly is a turn off. And it s the same strategy Southwest has used for most announcements. (Remember the new Rapid Rewards rollout? Bleh.)
More importantly, however, is that this shows the continued enterprise rental car phoenix airport upgauging of Southwest. The 737-700s will now have 143 seats. The airline is focusing its future orders on 737-800s with a lot more seats than that. It has already said it doesn t see much of a future for the 717. So how is Southwest going to really serve some of these smaller cities with only large-scale airplanes? It seems like there s a disconnect enterprise rental car phoenix airport here.
There s no question Southwest can adequately serve some of the larger AirTran cities, and it will likely come up with a good model for serving the international destinations as well. But I think Southwest is going to have a tougher time serving some of these smaller cities unless it really decides to shake up the way it operates. enterprise rental car phoenix airport I just haven t seen any kind of indication from the airline enterprise rental car phoenix airport that it s going to do anything enterprise rental car phoenix airport radical like that, so we ll just have to see if some of these smaller cities can actually survive.
Interesting that they are re-fitting the 717 s even though they do not intend to keep them for the long haul. I guess they want them branded Southwest and it would not make sense to put in old-style seats or re-use old ones so they don t have to purchase new ones for those planes.
Unless they plan to get the vast majority of growth with international expansion (similar enterprise rental car phoenix airport to Spirit), they will need to make those smaller markets work and grow. Although they already do not like the 717 s, they can learn a lot about small aircraft operations and switch to an aircraft over time that better meets tgeir economic and operational needs.
Do you know if Southwest managed to or wanted to try to renegotiate the leases, especially since many of them were from Boeing (iirc)? If they did, especially considering their order for 737NGs, the 717s might disappear a lot sooner than 2017.
I m sure that Southwest could get out of them earlier if it wanted. Boeing will bend over backwards to make Southwest happy. Maybe, however, Southwest is happy keeping the fleet going for a few years to help with the longer term transition, but I don t know for sure.
As for Dayton, it is a pretty big operation for Airtran with 8 departures a day. People in SW Ohio have been driving up to DAY to escape the Delta monopoly at CVG. In the era of ridiculousness in the 90s and 00s many people from Cincy would drive up to DAY and take a 20 minute Comair RJ back to CVG and on to their destination and in the process save $800 on a round trip.
Just because they named a lump of cities to vanish, well that AirTran (wink wink) will drop doesn t mean they are done cutting cities. WN said in the beginning they would keep all AirTran cities except DFW so they have to keep their word. So until the AirTran names drops for good, AirTran can cut more cities.
Seattle is the first to convert, but LAX is very close all but one of the AirTran flights become Southwest, the exception being the redeye to Atlanta. I would guess that s because Southwest doesn t do redeyes? I wonder if that will eventually enterprise rental car phoenix airport change
Precisely. The northern Detroit suburbs (where the money is) in areas like Auburn Hills and Troy are a straight-shot 45 min on I-75, actually closer than DTW. Additionally Flint is small and easy to operate out of. My guess is that Southwest will connect it to closer hubs like BWI, MDW etc and drop ATL.
I m also interested in the MKE/MDW adjustments. CAK-MDW is just the beginning. I hope that WN moves the important stuff to MDW, the less important stuff to STL/MCI and drop MKE to a spoke . This gives Frontier a little break as well, but WN probably doesn t want that.
BUT HOW LONG DO I HAVE TO WAIT FOR DCA-MDW? SORRY FOR ALL CAPS BUT THIS SHOULD BE THE BIGGEST enterprise rental car phoenix airport NO-BRAINER IN THE HISTORY OF EARTH!!! These were probably the only ATA flights in the history of that airline that were always full!
However, do note that yields from DCA drop when connections are involved. From what I ve seen, west coast and Texas fares are usually the same from DCA/IAD/BWI but flying within the east BWI is clearly cheaper.
based on full flights from DCA-MDW on ATA, i am guessing WN will be able to fill those seats primarily with O D traffic, with the best prices on connections and available from BWI and IAD (especially connections over MDW).
A full flight does not mean a successful flight, but I would imagine that National to Midway will happen. I don t know the full details, but I wonder if there might be an issue of transferring slots at National to a different certificate. Anyone know?
SDFers are trilled to see competition to ATL. I had a hunch that this was on the radar when they announced SDF-BHM was getting the ax. DL has had a strangle hold on the market since the mid 90s when VJet collapsed. (I do not count than daily Vision as viable competition, sorry) It will be interesting to see how DL protects its turf in SDF and DAY. It may serve as a templat