Midwest Airlines Midwest Miles - Some October schedule changes on midwestairlines.com

Looks like some new schedule changes loaded for October to the website.

--There are 5 lines of 717 flying and 5 lines of E190 flying.

--The CRJ fleet drops to 5.5 lines of flying, replaced by ERJ’s.

--The ERJ’s all show as “ER3”. However because Republic only has two ER3’s (already in YX*) it seems pretty sure that in fact it’s a website issue, and there are both ER3 and ER4.

--MSP loses their overnight CRJ, meaning they drop from 6x to 5x. However it looks like this is more a technical issue arising from the CRJ to ERJ transition than a reflection of demand. Two reasons:

(a) The pulled MSP flight is a CRJ and comes from one of the remaining CRJ lines of flying. However if they kept it, then all six remaining CRJ’s would be at outstations every night. That gives them no ability for routine overnight maintenance work in MKE. So one of the CRJ overnights had to be pulled to keep a CRJ in MKE, and since MSP currently has two overnight aircraft, pulling one didn’t hurt MSP’s schedule that much.

(b) Even with the screwy way the new schedules seem to be coming out, when a flight is axed they have still been reliably pulling it from the future schedule. The 6th MKE-MSP flight appears restored starting 11/1. That suggests it is coming back.


--OMA has another RJ upgraded to E170, MKE-OMA is now 3x E170 and 1x CRJ.

--The overnight E170 to Columbus changes to ERJ. What this means is that now none of the E170 fleet will overnight at Republic maintenance and crew bases in Pittsburgh or Columbus, and only one mid-day turn (the afternoon MKE-CMH-MKE) goes to either city. IT would appear, then, that enough crews and mechanics will be based out of Milwaukee to avoid needing those crew / maintenance rotations into PIT and CMH. (The afternoon MKE-CMH-MKE E170 turn regularly has plenty of demand for the larger E170, so I’m not sure if it survives to still rotate a crew in/out of CMH daily, or if it is strictly to meet demand.)


So far there don’t appear to be updates to the schedule further into winter. So while MKE-LAS goes to all-E190 in October, if you try to book in January it still shows one 717. My guess is that is because they plan to have different things in place later this winter.

So far there don’t appear to be updates to the schedule further into winter. So while MKE-LAS goes to all-E190 in October, if you try to book in January it still shows one 717. My guess is that is because they plan to have different things in place later this winter.

Makes sense.

Bryan Bedford has stated that it will take six months to right-size both Midwest and Frontier.

This weekend, Bedford was quoted in the Denver Post as saying that the Airbus jets are definately coming to Milwaukee for West Coast flying (he's also said they would be used on the Florida routes as well) and that there would be a lot of co-mingling of assets (I guess we'll see some E170s/E190s in DEN soon as well).

You'll be busy keeping track of all of these changes :)

Makes sense.

Bryan Bedford has stated that it will take six months to right-size both Midwest and Frontier.

This weekend, Bedford was quoted in the Denver Post as saying that the Airbus jets are definately coming to Milwaukee for West Coast flying (he's also said they would be used on the Florida routes as well) and that there would be a lot of co-mingling of assets (I guess we'll see some E170s/E190s in DEN soon as well).

You'll be busy keeping track of all of these changes :)

Any idea whether the Airbus jets will be painted in YX colors and some of the E-jets in Frontier? Will they be using Midwest or Frontier crews for the MKE Airbus flights?

Any idea whether the Airbus jets will be painted in YX colors and some of the E-jets in Frontier? Will they be using Midwest or Frontier crews for the MKE Airbus flights?

Not much is known at this point.

According to some of the recent press I've seen, Republic is in the process of finalizing its initial plans for Midwest and Frontier. However, few if any details are expected to be made public (at least not officially) until the Frontier sale closes, which is expected by mid September.

--The ERJ’s all show as “ER3”. However because Republic only has two ER3’s (already in YX*) it seems pretty sure that in fact it’s a website issue, and there are both ER3 and ER4.

Sounds like this might be an incorrect assumption...word has Republic acquiring five ER3's from Continental. Apparently CO owns them and used to lease them to ExpressJet to fly as CO*, but they have been parked in the desert for awhile. Likely a very, very good price on them.

Although the E135 is not as fuel-efficient as the E145 on a per-seat-mile basis, an E135 with 25-30 people onboard is significantly less expensive to fly AAA to BBB than an E145 with 25-30 people on the same mission.

Sounds like this might be an incorrect assumption...word has Republic acquiring five ER3's from Continental. Apparently CO owns them and used to lease them to ExpressJet to fly as CO*, but they have been parked in the desert for awhile. Likely a very, very good price on them.



Five more E135s would help Midwest right-size the Midwest Connect route structure a great deal.

This will help free lift for the the return of BDL, RDU and CWA. I also think the chances of MKG or STL service returning are helped a great deal by the availability of 37 seat aircraft.

We should be hearing some news fairly soon about new or expanded service.

So far there don’t appear to be updates to the schedule further into winter. So while MKE-LAS goes to all-E190 in October, if you try to book in January it still shows one 717. My guess is that is because they plan to have different things in place later this winter.

Digging around in the schedule, it's somewhat interesting to see what hasn't been updated yet.

Checking some random dates in December, most of the longer stage length regional jet routes still show the CRJ. This is especially true for EWR and PHL. With the last of the CRJs scheduled to leave the fleet in January, you'd think it would be fairly easy for Midwest to update the schedules accordingly. It's not like there's a capacity difference between the CRJ and ERJ. Plus, from a competitive stand point it would make sense to make the switch to the ERJ as quickly as possible...unless something else is in the works. We know that PHL high on the equipment upgrade list, so perhaps we'll be seeing some E170s on this route before year-end.

I also noticed that MKE-OMA reverts back to two CRJs and two E170s. Again something else might be in the works here as well.

The real question now is how many Airbus jets will be in MKE by year-end?

The real question now is how many Airbus jets will be in MKE by year-end?

I'm thinking about 4 - 5 A319's. My question is... How much back filling will be required in the Frontier fleet?

I'm thinking about 4 - 5 A319's. My question is... How much back filling will be required in the Frontier fleet?

Depending on the stage length and loads, Frontier might easily backfill some of those routes with E170 and E190s, perhaps using some of the USAirways E-Jets that are rumored to go to Republic.

I'm thinking about 4 - 5 A319's. My question is... How much back filling will be required in the Frontier fleet?

How many actual YX employees will be around by year's end? I'm thinking 4 or 5 in that category as well...

I took advantage of the 10,000 mile companion award sale and booked a mid-October LGA-MKE roundtrip last Friday, and they were showing 717 in both directions.

Just over an hour ago, I received both emails and phone calls letting me know that my flights have changed to E190 going and E170 returning.

Off topic, but it is annoying that the companion fare is booked on a separate PNR from the paid fare, and we therefore lost our seats 2 seats together on one of the flights. Easily fixed, but annoying nevertheless.