Originally Posted by
Beckles
There's a reason that only 79 A318's have been ordered ... it's just not efficient, and for an airline trying to be an ULCC, they can't afford to start with an inefficient new aircraft (I say new aircraft because Allegiant has proven you can go with inefficient old aircraft as long as you get them cheap enough).
Efficiency regarding fuel and such is debatable; but you can't beat the "efficiency" of not having to re-certify F9 pilots for the 318, since it's the same as a 319 or 320 in that respect.
With Republic out of the picture for E90s, the 318 would have been a nice fill-in for some of these short-runway, tertiary market situations F9 is trying to do.