george 3

I agree with this post. For my trips to smaller cities beyond the Rockies, I looked at the merger as an opportunity to connect through PHX rather than ORD or DFW which have far more weather related delays. Also, it provides more opportunity to fly from JFK than LGA which depending on the time of day, has less departure delays. Trips connecting through LAX involve expensive transcon flights, and a trip to the "nest" for the connection.

JDiver

Please: let's avoid overpersonalizing and questioning other members' motives. Posting about one airport or another, or even comparing them and their communities, do not imply hate or negative commentary. Let's keep to the topic.

/Moderator

ericcheung

I expect PHX to continue to be an important AA domestic hub. LAX remains too space constrained to shift flying to and AA needs a domestic connecting hub in the West, which DFW is too far for.

AA management has communicated that they want to keep increasing capacity as it is incrementally profitable and low cost carriers continue to keep fares low. DFW has seen increased competition from spirit and Southwest recently. Shifting capacity to DFW probably makes less sense now than before.

The fleet changes make sense. Am seeing AA 738s more frequently through PHX. But that's more a factor of US having a more optimized domestic fleet (largest A320 series operator) compared to LAA which had a lot of MD-80s which need to be retired. Post merger the standalone fleet adds of A319s and A321s on the AA side were shifted to as many A321s as possible. US 319s are doing some LAX long and thin flying that the MD80 didn't have the range for and the 738 was too big for, and those 738s are doing PHX flying replacing those 319s.

beyondhere

But AA's niche in PHX over Southwest is those flights to the East Coast (nonstop service to NYC and BOS, dominance of PHX-PHL), Canada, Alaska, Hawaii and LatAm.

AA's challenge in PHX is Southwest. In over several of PHX's top markets where AA directly competes against WN, WN dominates in market share and fare premium.

AA also has a perimeter exemption advantage over Southwest with AA having rights for PHX-DCA while Southwest lacks them. However in a couple of quarters, Southwest dominated over PHX-WAS marketshare likely through BWI.

TheBOSman

Partly as WN attracts fewer business flyers than AA on WAS-PHX. AA likely charges a somewhat premium fare for DCA-PHX (and DCA-PHX-anywhere else). WN can undercut that, and AA is likely happy to let people paying lower fares go to WN. And, WN uses its DCA exemption to here at AUS, as it has a much stronger frequent flyer base (and business traveler base) in Austin and in Texas than it does at PHX.

beyondhere

WN dominated Q1 of 2014 and Q1 of 2015 in fare and marketshare. Maybe an uptick of snowbird traffic (which is leisure driven), but the two are pretty close year-round from 2014 data, although this was US (for 2014). It's just interesting from a DCA vs. BWI perspective, more than a AA vs. WN perspective, as the assumed knowledge was that DCA is a premium fare airport over BWI.

Fortunately for both of them, neither F9 or NK has ventured on PHX-BWI/IAD. That would cause fare drops by WN and AA on PHX-WAS fares.

As WN has become a high fare carrier, it might not be such a concern and AA might co-exist there with WN, but WN dominates too many PHX routes. It's one thing as DL dominates PHX-ATL and DL dominates it's flights to it's 2-3 hubs, but WN has too many hubs/large stations on the other side, where it dominates both fare and marketshare (California, Chicago, DEN, Texas, STL, etc.) from PHX. I think lack of change fees and easy schedule changing, might be why people are selecting Southwest in PHX on those routes.

WRCSolberg

Phoenix MSA has almost twice the populations of Charlotte's, more high net worth individuals, a far larger GMP, and something that Charlotte doesn't have at all - a booming tourism industry.

To quote Fortune 500 companies here is to take things out of context. St. Louis, MO has 9 F500s, more than PHX and CLT, but I don't think you'll find anyone here arguing that STL is an economic powerhouse.

WiscAZ

This may be a stupid question but do you think AA would ever throw a couple of flights out of Mesa Gateway in PHX? I've never been to the airport (and I live about 5 minutes from it) but drive by it often and have always thought about it.

It seems like it would be a price effective way to push some originating PHX passengers to that airport who plan to connect anyways. Maybe a once a day flight to DFW and ORD or something like that. Just a thought. It may be far more difficult than I am thinking but curious if it could work.

Fanjet

Probably as much a possibility as AA starting flights out of the airport in Wilimington, DE.

Besides, didn't Allegiant already move into that airport?

rubikcube

Just a data point, the LBB-PHX route is ending on 6/1. This makes me sad since it was a great alternative to DFW for getting to the west coast.

phlwookie

Ha, I actually live a bit closer to ILG than I do PHL, and haven't considered using it over PHL for the token services attempted over the years by the likes of DL and F9, and I don't believe there is any commercial service there now. There just isn't a compelling reason geographically to use it instead, and PHL isn't that hard to get to from the southern Philly suburbs. People in northern Delaware generally use PHL with some bleed to BWI, as it's not really far at all to PHL. ILG might be a reliever airport in the distant future, but there's just no need now, and PHL is far closer to more people in the Philly metro area.

At this point, PHX is not exactly maxed out, and redeploying assets to another Phoenix-area airport would either cannibalize PHX or, more likely, just be a waste of resources versus the potential revenue doing so might bring.

F9 (Frontier) has been a bit more successful at TTN, but it's at least in an area that is annoying drive to either EWR or PHL depending on the time of day due to traffic and distance, and lately F9 has been building up a PHL presence more anyway.

YtravelF

Where are you getting that info from?
There's been no announcement and flights are still coming up for sale in the GDS'

carlosdca

I don't see the relationship between the F500 rank of a company and the amount of travel its employees do.

Some F500 are very large but they are geographically spread-out (so where the HQs is not indicative of much).

I worked at a F500 firm and I was one of the few ones (out of ~100 in my local office) doing heavy travel. And the travel policy sucked (corporate travel website that forced us to pick cheapest travel or nonstop, no business class even for long haul, even if reimbursable!)

Now I work at a boutique consulting firm and 80% of my colleagues at my tiny office travel heavily (and travel policies are much more flexible, been flying paid J this year a lot).

Anyway, YAY to PHX. Unless I am connecting to an international flight or to JFK, I don't see a reason why I would prefer LAX over PHX.

WiscAZ

Ha! I figured! Just was thinking about it

Yes they did. I don't know how big the airport even is

wandering_fred

I have actually taken a commercial flight from ILG (1960s - Allegheny if I recall correctly) but alas I understand the economic changes that have reformed the American air transport industry. Perhaps someday there will be a commercial agreement to use the runways at Dover AFB, which is a bit further from PHL/BWI/DCA.

As for PHX, the passenger rail connection to Tuscon can't come fast enough, though prices exArizona on AA are mostly non-competitive.

PS: Yes I hope I still have friends in both areas.

Happy wandering

Fred