Expand Shuttle to include BOS-PHL post-merger?
 

I have often wondered why BOS-LGA and BOS-DCA have made sense as Shuttle routes but BOS-PHL has not. USAir operations on that route have seemed quite Shuttle-like, with high frequency hourly departures throughout day. For whatever reasons, USAir kept the BOS-PHL route as a separate (from the Shuttle), standard route.

In a post-merger world, with the combined company being tied (with B6) for the largest airline in BOS, do the economics or other characteristics of the BOS-PHL route change such that it might now make sense to convert it to be part of the Shuttle? If so, what change would that have in practice and would it be better or worse than the status quo?

(1) I think a much higher percentage of BOS-PHL is connecting beyond PHL.

(2) I think there is far less regular business travel on this route. Not that there aren't a lot of business travelers. But there are many organizations with very frequent travel on the Shuttle routes and they thus negotiate specific Shuttle contracts. I am a lawyer and recently traveled with a client on LGA-BOS v/v. My ticket was almost 50% lower due to my corporate contract because we have big offices in all three cities whereas the client never has a use for the Shuttle and thus their organization, a Fortune 100 company, doesn't have a Shuttle contract. I think there are far fewer organizations who would be interested in negotiating a specific BOS-PHL contract.

This ^

The shuttle is optimized for business travelers on short (and often same day) trips. It has a set hourly schedule as people frequently catch earilier or later flights when meetings get out early, etc. I believe there is also a fair amount of walk-up and last minute bookings.

While BOS-PHL has an even greater frequency then the shuttle, it is optimized for people connecting and not as business heavy of a route. My guess is the schedule is more based on when the largest amount of pax are arriving or departing PHL.

There are a couple of dozen city pairs that get ~hourly service but don't see Shuttle branding by AA, Delta or UA. PHL has no part in the fifty year history of Shuttle branding.

How long is Shuttle service ex BOS going to remain hourly (especially to DCA). Couldnt be more than 20 on my flight last night.

US did introduce a "shuttle-like" service on BOS-PHL back when WN was flying it. They called it FastPath, and it included using the closest gates to security for PHL-BOS flights, dedicated check-in counters/kiosks, and priority security for (I think) those on nonstop itineraries. As soon as WN was gone from the route, so was FastPath.

it's a distinction without a meaning. USS is almost all mainline service with roughly the same hard & soft product as US.

AA could drop the specialized branding and keep the route-specific corporate contracts. Not only very significant discounts (from really high base fares), but also a lot of deals on flexibility and auto-UG's by treating sub-Y fares as Y for UG purposes and the like.

I don't particularly care how they brand the service, simply that they continue the simple-to-understand and pragmatic service.

The branding goes all the way back to the Eastern Shuttle, as do the 3 routes. There's really no reason routes couldn't be added other than tradition. The three routes do have a high percentage of business traffic in common, however.

Jim

There was a time when US had dedicated single class A320s assigned to and branded to the Shuttle. I remember one time sitting next to Bob Dole. There used to be light refreshments served. I remember in the late 90s and into the next decade before 9/11 the $69 round trip weekend specials.

I believe it was after merging with the Shuttle US decided that using a dedicated group of planes didn't make sense - what did Eastern know anyway. So an A320 might fly CLT-LGA then a Shuttle segment then back into the general system. After finding that NE delays then rippled throughout the US network US decided that maybe Eastern knew what they were doing after all and went back to a semi-dedicated fleet where a plane might spend an entire day doing Shuttle ops before/after flying in the general network.

One thing about the pre-HP US was that they had to unlearn a lot of "it's the way we've always done it" tricks.

Jim

The last vestige was the shift to Zone boarding. USS could board a typical 319/320 in 10-15 minutes until it succumbed to the DYKWIA's and now we're back to the 25 mins.

I recall the Eastern version which not only had no seat assignments, but no reservations with ticketing onboard. However a seat guaranteed because they had backup aircraft to run extra sections.

Yeah, thr old days of the Shuttle were great - go to the airport knowing that there would be a seat available since Eastern would just pull out another plane if needed. IIRC, that ended before the Shuttle was sold to Trump and it was never a feature of the Shuttle US operated then bought.

Jim

Though FastPath check in was retired after WN was run off the route, nearly all PHL-BOS mainline flights still use PHL gate C17 (one of the closest to C security), with some using the neighboring C18/19/21. Gates close to the terminal entrance were part of the marketing of that.

I don't have stats handy but BOS has to be one of the top O&D business routes out of PHL, and one of the busiest where you can pretty reliably do a day trip. My company alone buys an average 550 seats weekly on this route for folks in our Boston and Philadelphia offices traveling between the two cities, primarily as it's beyond a feasible Acela day trip, unlike DC or NY from Philly. I do PHL-BOS 3-4 times per month and rarely don't see someone I know on the plane :)

Actually Jim, it was. I was based at LGA. It lasted for a long time until the fleet changed to not having dedicated Shuttle a/c.

You can buy your ticket with the app and use the app to check-in so it doesn't seem like that much of a loss to lose the FastPath, but I never used it so I don't know what I'm missing.