Jenks5709

Just assigned the "west region" and 4 provinces in Canada. Have never been responsible for this territory before. All flying will be done from BWI.

Looking for suggestions re: best airline(s) (one or two in order to build miles?) and airports to fly into.

Thanks for any hints.

JerryFF

Three airlines come to mind initially. Each has its pros and cons.

1) United - with nonstop flights to its hub in Denver and connections to many western US and Canadian cities, you can probably get to most of your destinations. Except for the occasional really bad storms in the winter, DEN is actually a pretty good airport for connections. Also, UA has nonstops to SFO and LAX with additional connections possible there up and down the west coast, providing many additional options and alternatives, especially with the DEN weather gets bad.

2) Northwest - similar to United with its hub in MSP. Again, winter weather can be bad for connections. Upgrades seem more generous than on UA for elite levels but the quality of 1st class is not as good (according to most people I've talked with). With its code-sharing and reciprocal mileage accural with DL and CO, NW offers many additional options.

3) USAir - With the merger with America West, US has numerous nonstops to PHX and LAS and connections to many cities from both of those. Winter weather is rarely a problem in either of these two hubs. On the downside, many would argue that US is one of the least reliable of the major carriers in terms of delays and cancelled flights. US still has a reciprocal mileage agreement with UA, so you can fly both of them and collect miles in whichever seems preferable. It's not clear how long this reciprocity will go on now, given the merger with HP, since the main purpose was to give UA fliers more east coast choices and US fliers more west coast options. US is now a more direct competitor with UA.

I'm sure others would have many other good ideas.

cblaisd

Jenks5709, welcome to FT and congratulations on the new gig.

Very good advice from the previous poster

I'm going to move this from The West forum to the WAS/BWI forum since I think you'll get even more help from those who live in that area and have figured out which is best from BWI to the west coast.

cblaisd
Senior Moderator

slawecki

I don't think you can do much to west on direct out of BWI. so it is a transfer flight. If the 4 canada prov. are YT, NWT, BC, and alberta, and there is much of that, you will probably need a canadian partner. so you want to choose an alliance that has some canadian airline in it.

US is not a very nice airline at the moment. there Republic partner is much nicer than US.

I have only flown NW once, and found their first similar to that of UA in the two cabin planes.

AA has a nice product out of BWI.

If you will get tickets for F&C travel, consider M&M, as the mileage for premium seats is much higher than in any other program that I know of.

You don't have to fly the program you buy. only the "team"

ND76

The pickings are relatively slim for non-stop flights to the west coast.

Of the "legacy" airlines, United has one non-stop to SFO early in the morning and the turn-around leaves SFO around 2:30 p.m. and gets back here around 10:30 p.m. I think they also have one or two non-stops to LAX. Similarly, US Airways has a couple of non-stops to both SFO and LAX.

Southwest has non-stops to LAX and to OAK (they discontinued a non-stop to SJC).

I am a degenerate Delta flyer--they have a non-stop to SLC after 5:00 p.m (this month it is leaving here at 5:17 p.m.) that has a wealth of connections to most airports on the Pacific coast and the intermountain west, including connections to places like Edmonton and Calgary. The usual in-flight time on this flight is 4:15, give or take a few minutes, and the flight, at least in F, is quite nice. I'm batting 100% on upgrades on this flight. In a real touch of irony, the best airport lounge bar in the US is the Delta Crown Room in the Salt Lake airport (usually 6 bottled microbrews and 2 draft microbrews, Guinness stout in a bottle, along with the usual collection of wine and spirits).

Northwest has a good bit of service to Washington, Montana and the Dakotas via MSP (they go to places like Regina and Saskatoon)--they just got done moving their gates back to where they were at the left end of Pier C, across from Delta).

BWI also has 3-4 daily flights to Toronto via Air Canada Jazz, from where you could connect to places in western Canada.

tazi

Southwest has daily non-stops to LAX from BWI <duck>

whlinder

AirTran also has a nonstop to SEA...

violist

This may have been true once upon a time, but it isn't now.

slawecki

Too far for an rj 170?

violist

Actually, I tried the E190 last week. Kind of nice, though
I admit it was just BOS-PHL.

slawecki

I don't think that the E190 will do bwi-west coast non-stop either. my comment was directed to the fact that us has a large fleet of small planes.

I take a republic(usair) E170 dca-dfw every month or so. nice Y cabin plane. nice FA's. bring your own food and entertainment.

violist

I hate to break this to you - the 190's range is 2760 statute miles,
enough for Boston to San Fran. And though US has only 5 of these
aircraft, it has orders for 50 and an option on 50 more.

My comment, though, was directed not to the feasibility of this
occurring but rather to that the comfort level isn't worse than
that of those darned Airbuses.

slawecki

I show bos-sfo at 4335km, and range of Long range E190 at 4260km. Don't they put in a 1 hr safety factor or something. Or does the 4260 km have that factor built in?

I guess they could get back due to tail winds, but how do they get there?

"Maday, Maday Control tower, we have a flame out here"

I do not believe the seat spacing to be correctly reported on the 170's, or the seats are much thinner than on the airbus stuff. I think the 170 is quite comfortable compared to airbus.

CO FF

I have family near BWI, so I fly LAX-BWI about 1x/year.

If your employer will pay for F, then UA is the answer. DEN, SEA or LAX, plus the Air Canada network thru *A...

But my guess is that coach is in your future.

If you have (or want to have) status on United, E+ probably wins out vs WN. But since there are a lot of UA status pax in the greater DC area, you probably won't do to well on upgrades unless you get to PremierExecutive (1P) status, and even then they'll be rather costly. If you get to 1K status (100,000 miles/yr), the CR-1s will be very useful, especially on the westbound transcon.

WN is actually pretty comfortable in Y, but has the disadvantage of forcing you to get to the gate very early to stake out your preferred seat (even with an A BP). Plus, the transcon frequency is limited, and there are no redeye returns.

violist

Not sure. I think we agree on the comfort factor, but my numbers
are from the Embraer website, which claims 2400 nm or 4445 km.