Originally Posted by
djp98374
The only rational reason I can think why they do this route is because they still have a United maintenance shop in Indy.
Thus the route becomes a way to fly aircraft into Indy and fly the repaired ones out.
There's lots of aircraft maintenance in IND, but it's not UAL maintenance; the IND base closed in 2003. AAR now occupies much of the former UAL facility. Perhaps UA outsources maintenance to AAR.