If I remember correctly, our current mayor was the mayor at the time CO canceled EFD service in 2004.

I took Larry aside to ask about the recent articles in the news about airlines spinning off their FF programs. His take was:

He has yet to see a really good analysis that shows it makes sense.
The AC experiment is not really valid because of the AC captive audience.
The major concern he has would be loss of control to customer data. He feels that this is a key issue and a dealbreaker that would need to be resolved to his satisfaction.
IF it is shown to be a good business move, and IF some of the US majors move this way, IF it is good for Continental, its employees, its customers, and its shareholders, and IF all his concerns are addressed, he would go with the herd. But I got the impression that this would be a long way off and he doesnot expect it to happen anytime soon.

Exactly. If we didn't have to pay to make the change in fare class, then it would be much easier for PAX with these restrictions by the companies to pay the extra themselves. What about extending the 24 hour no fee for cancellation to a no fee for changing a ticket period within 24 hours? So this way, you could buy the ticket for one class of service, then within 24 hours change the ticket to the higher class of service.

Decided too off-topic. Deleted by poster.

Will changes to OnePass make you happy?
 

So at the first OnePass panel discussion, we heard that there will be changes to OnePass program and we will get an email about it middle of this month? Anyone want to speculate what these will be?

I did learn that the DoubleTree bartenders think I'm 15, yet the PC folks didn't think twice ^

I just wish it were that way with internet use too. I can just see all bells, whistles and sirens going off every time someone sends an EMail or other similar audible tones when using the net in the air. It could be worse than cell phones

...are you familiar with that 'looking young and being elite...' train wreck of a thread? :D

Oh very much so. The S/O laughed at me when I told her why it took so long for me to bring her a Lonestar ;)

More info
 

Believe it or not, I found another sheet of notes from the DO this morning. Nothing all that ground-breaking, but a few interesting thoughts to share:

From Kerwin, the affable and jovial co.com employee who "worked" our bus ride to and from downtown:
The AF availability on co.com is ~130 destinations. Not too shabby overall, but certainly not all of AF's options.

From the Operations Center (SOCC):

• The XJET/CHQ flights will always be the first to go when irrops kick in. Not all that much of a surprise, but the guy was pretty frank about it.
• When a flight is 3 hours late escalation pages are sent to a core group of ~10 managers, including Larry, and 30 minutes after that a mandatory conf call gets put together with the same group to figure out what is going on.
• All of the dispatchers have meterology training, so CO doesn't have a dedicated meterology department. They also buy a lot of data from the Weather Channel's parent company and contract some stuff from NWA.
• The have to block a lot of seats on some of the 752s to get them back from their longer TATL runs. They aim to only have 3% of the TATL flights for any one route require a scheduled refuel (ie Gander stop), but the congestion in EWR will occasionally drive that number up.

From the Test Kitchen:

• New Domestic F menus will be coming out on 11/1, including a sandwich and salad, plus a fruit plate
• Domestic F is going to be served on BF china starting in October or November, with the domestic F plates cycled out of the fleet over ~6 months. CO expects that the efficiencies of a single set of plates will pay for this change.
• Every improvement in the catering department comes through some other efficiency/cost cut somewhere else. They are still a cost center to the airline, so they have to be very frugal.
• Ziggy, the director of the group, take enormous pride in the presentation of the food, in addition to the taste. He also was wrapping up to-go plates for all of us as the event would down, which was incredibly nice.
• The new mushroom soup is apparently phenomenal, according to Mrs. sbm12, who had more than one sampler.
• They use cream-based soups instead of broth-based because they travel better and are less likely to spill, especially when chilled in the carts.
• The Indian meat dishes for the DEL flight (and probably BOM) are actually cooked in the LAX kitchen and flown over to EWR to cater the flight (this one makes no sense to me at all).

Like I said, nothing shocking here, but some interesting information.

Thanks sbm13 for the very thorough reviews. ^

There are a lot of talk and description (history and cool features) about "the bunker", but let me descibe what I learn from that tour.

- The backup facility actually has 2 parts. There's an operation center on the ground floor of a 4-storey office building, sitting high atop Lake Conroe in Montgomery Texas. The facility is always "hot", with all phones and computer terminals active. However, on normal days, it is NOT manned.

- That facility has large windows built with bullet-proof glass, and nice vista. It is NOT in the bunker itself.

- Since the facility became on-line last year, they have run the airline out of that place about 6 times. To make sure things work, and small things like making sure the employees know WHERE the building is located. To the customers and other employees not involved in operations, the transfer was totally transparent. People won't know if CO was operating from Smith Street or Montgomery.

- Montgomery is on different power grid from Houston, and all communication lines run north towards Dallas. And of course, that building has its own backup generators and so on.

- The whole bunker has 40,000 sq ft of floor space on 2 floors. CO's only renting 1,800 sq ft at a corner on the lower floor, about 50ft below ground, with its own access. Normally, nobody works down there, though we saw a lot of corned beef and bottled water in the corner.

- The building sits on a hill about 340 ft above sea level; about 140 feet above Lake Conroe and the surrounding areas. So, even though the bunker is 50 ft underground, it still sits much higher than the surrounding area and therefore no risk of flooding whatsoever.

- In an emergency, like a major hurricane hitting Houston, about 400 people can work in the facility (mostly like 12 on, 12 off). They have arrangement with Montgomery authorities, hotels, bus companies, etc to serve the workers. All who decide to stay in the area and work at the facility are volunteers. Family members are usually flown out to other parts of the country.

I got carded at the Doubletree, as well.

Don't you mean that glorious thread? ;)

We asked about the corned beef and the other food items. The tour guide explained that some of that was moved out of the kitchen for the people who are working out of there at times. It's a lot easier than walking back and forth up the stairs.

Reading the little document they handed out on the bus I learned that CO was running a test at the facility on Sunday and then giving tours of the bunker to the employees and having a BBQ.

If you are looking for a place for data backup, the bunker may be perfect for you. There are lockers that you can rent or rows of lockers that can store backup servers and their corresponding equipment.

CO's actual server room was nice though a little more dusty than I expected for critical systems.

Was there any "official" word on our access to Gordon's Galley by any management participants?

Since almost all my flights will connect through IAH from now on (sorry, EWR), I'd actually prefer enjoying a nice dinner down there along with some shopping - even if it meant skipping Pappadeux's :)