Fanjet

People also need to look at the bigger picture regarding RDU. AA/US is the largest carrier now at the airport, with WN right behind it. DL comes in at a distant 3rd, even though it has the most destinations served from there. What should AA start that DL is currently serving? BWI? ATL? FLL? The new AA would not only be competing with DL on those routes, but WN as well.

LovePrunes

another curiosity about AA's feelings on the significance of RDU is that it's one of the "exception" markets to the first class food service. RDU is one of a handful of cities, and CLT is NOT, that offers "enhanced" first class food from ORD. Certainly it must be for competitive reasons, but obviously good for RDU to get the extra love from AA both with on board service as well as flights.

Global321

Not sure how you are calculating market share. According to RDU, looking at passenger travel for September 2014 - Delta is #1...

1. Delta - 29.9%
2. Southwest/Airtran - 21.9%
3. American - 16.7%
4. USAIR - 15.0%
5. United - 9.8%
6. Jetblue - 5.0%
7. Frontier - 1.0%
8. Air Canada - 0.7%

AA/US will be #1 if things stay the same (31.7%), but just barely. Interesting to note that AA share has dropped year over year (-3.1%) and USAIR has gone up (+7.9%)

(based to departures)

If anything, RDU may be due for some flight cuts... passenger load is around 80%, while the airline industry has been around 85%. Or it could take some time to absorb additional seats. (Delta cut SLC less than 1 year after starting it, but added 4 new markets, boosting total seats out of RDU by 7%.)

Delta is #1 in the market now. IMHO - after the merge next year and the harmonizing of routes / route optimization / whatever term you want, Delta will still be #1 at the end of 2015.

cbn42

Actually, if traffic falls to the point where the revenue guarantee needs to be invoked, it may cause the sponsor to reevaluate the guarantee to avoid a financial hit. While everyone wants international flights, very few private companies are willing to actually pay money to subsidize them. A revenue guarantee is supposed to eliminate the risk for the airline in starting up the service, but it is not something to rely on in the long run.

I have never flown RDU-LHR, but I have seen this flight very often when doing AA award searches. Long after LAX, ORD and JFK flights to LHR are full, RDU-LHR will still have Saver space available. This can't be a good sign, even if most of the corporate customers are in the premium cabin.

kettle1

Pan Am was forced to declare bankruptcy on January 8, 1991. Delta Air Lines purchased the remaining profitable assets of Pan Am, including its remaining European routes and Frankfurt mini hub, the Shuttle operation, 45 jets, and the Pan Am Worldport at John F. Kennedy Airport, for $416 million.

So AA took over Pan Am?

Alex_I

- Not for J MileSaver. That is rarely available.

MOC991

DL let PanAm liquidate after they took it over. AA bought part of PanAm's MIA operation around the same time they dehubbed RDU. I'm not sure what I misread so that is my fault. TWA was the airline that AA bought. I guess I was just mixed up. However, I guess the RDU hub was never profitable back in those days when competition still existed and O/D wasn't nearly as strong. It is really irrelevant to the current O/D and competitive situation now.

kettle1

AA obtained many of Eastern's routes from Miami to Latin America and the Caribbean and that is how AA became so strong in those areas with a new hub added in MIA, around 25 years ago.

How did AA treat those TWA employees after the merger (buyout)?

2 men that ruined two great airlines - Carl Icahn (TWA) and Frank Lorenzo (Eastern).

I agree with this. ^

F&B767

The route is very frequently sold out in J with Y barley 100 or less, during the summer though it does well in both cabins. A lot of people miss that J is mostly full of revenue tickets, RDU is the only market of its size to have a full time sales person based there, has a club, tons of CK clients, and have you ever seen the cargo being loaded on the LHR flight? RDU is a premium heavy market for AA, however, DL ias made a lot of inroads, they haven't touched DCA because AA has fought and mainted that premium market. With US none of that will change.

MOC991

You're right. I honestly found some source that misstated the extent of what they bough from PanAm. I was just responding to the other person's remark on if RDU was dehubbed, it must be bad even though that was 20 years ago.

I really feel like there is a lot of negativity and perceived disagreement on these things. My points since the beginning.

1. People don't drive to CLT from RDU to fly. It isn't a CLT vs RDU argument. The argument is whether RDU should get more flights and whether the RDU market by itself would justify it. I think it does.

2. AA doesn't have any short-term incentive to expand because of connections in CLT. I agree with that, but I think people, especially business travelers, avoid that connection in lieu of direct flights or another airline. My point is if AA doesn't expand in the medium term, they are losing the market to Delta and Southwest. The combined AA/US and United are already losing domestic market share to Delta nationally. It is either going to expand under AA or DL in my opinion. I suppose DL is in a good position to offer the west coast connection to SEA and an international flight to KLM/AMS or AF/CDG.

3. RDU is more central and well-connected I leaving it with a broader O/D base. Asheville is really the only market I can see that would drive to CLT in some cases, but it is probably cheaper to fly out of Asheville or GSO.

kettle1

DL currently or will serve from RDU to: ATL, BWI, BOS, CUN, CVG, CLE, CMH, DTW, FLL, BDL, IND, LAS (I think this is now gone), LAX, MEM, MIA, MSP, NAS, JFK, MCO, PHL, SLC and TPA nonstop.

RDU Served By:
Atlanta ATL Delta, Southwest
Baltimore/Washington BWI Delta, Southwest
Boston BOS Delta, JetBlue
Cancun, Mexico CUN Delta (seasonal service)
Charlotte CLT US Airways
Chicago-Midway MDW Southwest
Chicago-O'Hare ORD American, United
Cincinnati CVG Delta
Cleveland CLE Delta, Frontier
Columbus CMH Delta
Dallas-Ft. Worth DFW American
Denver DEN Southwest
Detroit DTW Delta
Fort Lauderdale FLL Delta, JetBlue, Southwest
Hartford BDL Delta
Houston-Bush IAH United
Houston-Hobby HOU Southwest
Indianapolis IND Delta
Las Vegas LAS Delta, Southwest
London-Heathrow LHR American
Los Angeles LAX American, Delta
Memphis MEM Delta
Miami MIA American, Delta (Begins December)
Minneapolis/St. Paul MSP Delta
Nashville BNA Southwest
Nassau NAS Delta (Begins December)
Newark EWR United
New York-Kennedy JFK American, Delta, JetBlue
New York-LaGuardia LGA American, Delta
Orlando MCO AirTran, Delta, Southwest
Philadelphia PHL Delta, US Airways
Phoenix PHX Southwest
Pittsburgh PIT US Airways
San Francisco SFO United
St. Louis STL Southwest
Tampa-St. Petersburg TPA Delta, Southwest
Toronto, Canada YYZ Air Canada
Trenton-Mercer County TTN Frontier
Washington-Dulles IAD United
Washington-Reagan DCA American, US Airways

Will AA/US step it up at RDU? It looks like AA/US only wants to fly to hubs. DL is hitting many more non-hub destinations, most on RJ's.

Global321

Load factors in RDU don't support your argument to grow the market by any significant number.

AA lost share over the last year. Both Delta and Southwest have grown.

More central to who?

SLC is cancelled.

Agreed

MOC991

2010-8/2014 All Airlines Origin Average Annual Load Factor
DCA 77.67
RDU 79.12
PHL 80.83
DFW 82.28
CLT 83.36

I don't think there is enough to differentiate. The numbers specific to AA and US are slightly better but seem to follow the same trend.

2012 Population Estimates
2 hours or less RDU
1,998,808 RDU CSA

300,694 Rocky Mount/Wilson CSA
172,544 Greenville, NC MSA
128,119 New Bern mSA
59,339 Kinston mSA
123,697 Goldsboro MSA
183,263 Jacksonville MSA
263,429 Wilmington MSA
546,175 Fayetteville/Lumberton CSA
58,752 Sanford mSA

3,834,820 Total

This is a pretty good, albeit annoyingly small, picture of where people drive from to fly out of RDU.
http://rdublog.com/2014/08/22/going-...ted-community/
A big part of that is that there is less traffic and multiple freeways out of RDU like I-40,85,95(via US 64 NE,I-40 S) and US-1,64,70.

Both CLT and RDU
1,611,243 Greensboro/Winston-Salem CSA is a little closer to RDU by about 30 minutes and there is less traffic.

2 hours or less CLT
2,454,619 CLT CSA

456,255 Asheville CSA

1,438,550 Greenville, SC-Spartanburg CSA
922,242 Columbia, SC CSA

5,271,666 Total

I think the difference with CLT is most don't drive to CLT even if within 1-2 hours because the prices are usually more than local connections and the traffic can be quite awful. GSP has Southwest flights and is pretty competitive on price and destination versus driving to CLT which is a big part of their larger population base. I'm also curious why one would have such a vested interest in making RDU sound like it isn't doing well. The economic stats, load factor, industry, and population base are all pretty good. I'm pretty tired of looking up stuff that doesn't agree with what I'm being told. 79 vs 83 load factor doesn't sound like a nail in the coffin. RDU, CLT, and the I-85 corridor in its entirety are all doing better than others leading up to and after the recession.

I agree that AA might not be the one to do it though. Especially for international where it sounds like RDU really wants FRA or CDG which means LH/UA or DL/AF. Also in their reply on their blog, they're saying within the next few years for an international flight, so that sounds better than the 10 years that someone was quoting. It is just a PR response though so it may be overly optimistic.
http://rdublog.com/2014/08/29/going-...ise-of-europe/

cmd320

No expansion at RDU. If anything I would expect to see a slight draw down as AA forces more connections through CLT.

Global321

The current numbers are a 5 point swing - RDU vs. National average. Just over 4 points between CLT and RDU. Could that be enough to justify cutting flights? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe there will be more routes need to be cut. Could simply be new entrants/routes int the market are not mature yet.

Agree on prices, but hard to agree about people not driving to CLT. In the last 5 years CLT has more than doubled parking spaces available - and it still sells out during the holidays. That says locals ARE flying out of CLT in increasing numbers.

Not sure if that is aimed at me or not. I think RDU is doing fine - both the airport and the area. And I believe - like you - it will continue to grow. Up thread, several people made completely inaccurate statements, probably based to their passion for the area.

Like you - I like to put the facts before everyone - or have the facts show to me (as you have). Then everyone can make an informed guess as to what will happen. And for all of us it is a guess.

More international flights? Doubtful in the near term. Long term? Hard to tell.