Originally Posted by
BoeingBoy
For flights to Europe, JFK is pretty much on the way. So routing (connecting) there doesn't take people away from Europe first. ORD, depending on the origin city, can be convenient or out-of-the-way. Both are more hassle and delay prone than CLT, admittedly. To me, the one thing that may weigh in PHL's favor is the amount of O&D at NYC - another airport with a decent amount of O&D could be useful for additional service to European destinations.
ORD serves a pretty large area as well as JFK does plus it also has a rather large base of O&D traffic. Unfortunately, CLT has low O&D relative to either JFK or ORD - most European carriers serve ORD/JFK and not CLT/PHL for a reason.
Jim
I am of the opinion that PHL will retain a good chunk, if not all of its TATL service. While JFK has far more O&D, there is substantially more competition, and AA is a distant #3 in NY among the US majors. Furthermore, AA can't come close to replicating the domestic feed that DL and UA have in NY to support a gigantic European departure bank like they can at PHL, and the geographic position is more optimal than ORD.
I think JFK will keep what O&D can support in addition to what's at PHL, but I don't think PHL will lose much at all to JFK.
In terms of CLT, most of that service is seasonal in any case - if its largely connection based, CLT is a good option for the summer peak with its huge feeder operation. In any case, all of the CLT service also already exists at PHL (most of it on a year-round basis).