I was L. A. area resident for 12 years and intra-California flights on AA used to be topic of interest for me. I wonder if AA ever wanted to be a dominant carrier in intra-California or not. I understand that Southwest has moved into intra-California market and now the dominant player.
AA moved into intra-California market by acquiring AirCal, remember back then? That was first time I saw 737 in AA color, yes there was once AA operated 737-300 acquired from AirCal. Then slowly what once was AirCal disappeared from AA system. Reno Air moved into intra-California market and become a partner with AAdvantage. Remember flying Reno Air to the Bay Area and Vegas. Then AA acquired Reno Air. Currently AA has handful of LAX-SFO and LAX-LAS flights, but is there any other routes left once belonged to AirCal or Reno Air today?
When I first moved to L. A. remember United had hourly 737 service between LAX-SFO and LAX-SJC. Early morning weekdays and late afternoon weekdays United had 737 flying LAX-SFO every 20 minutes. But looked like intra-California market was never on the top of the list for AA. US used to have pretty decent intra-California flights after acquiring PSA but nothing of PSA is left today. Used to fly LAX-OAK and LAX-SJC on AA MD80 but that is past now…
Remember there were larger than expected US Dividend Miles members in Los Angeles area, those were people used to be PSA frequent flyers (my formal boss one of them). Remember they were not happy about US having minimal presence in California. Then merger with America West brought better options to L.A. area US Dividend Miles members. Joining StarAlliance and able to acquire miles on UA was plus of L. A. area member also, remember my formal boss got award seats on LH and vacation at Germany. Now joining AA and becoming OneWorld. Those PSA frequent flyers in L. A. who stuck with the program sure had a lot of changes. Are they happy now? Should ask my formal boss.
I am sure younger FlyerTalker reading this has no idea about AirCal and PSA. After Googling about these airlines then thinking how old is this AlwaysAisle guy…?
