mAAine_flyer

Wow No disrespect, but most of us don't live in the Center of the Known Universe (which is apparently "Between BDL and PVD"). Just because you think it's ok to drive 4.5 hrs from Pellston to Detroit to catch a flight, the residents/tourists/businesses of Pellston (or any other Small Town, USA) probably feel otherwise.

I gotta say, I was dubious about the whole "I'm 6ft3in and can't fit in an RJ" thing from the get-go, and reading this latest rant makes me seriously start to doubt your opinions. Sorry.

BiggAW

Actually, the vast majority of people in the United States live in a metro area with commercial mainline air service from multiple carriers. And a lot of the people who don't live in a major metro area can't afford the insane prices that the regionals charge to go to BFE. The market being served by these flights to BFE are a teeny, tiny fraction of the fraction of the population that flies. Other cities served by some regionals, like BDL and PVD, could easily be served by fewer mainline flights, as opposed to more regional flights, as WN does today. This would lead to increased system efficiency.

Pellston specifically is the middle of f'ing nowhere. I have gone to an area 45 minutes from there many times, either by car from CT, or by flying to the airport that best serves that area, DTW, and beating up a rental car on I-75. I have driven by the airport, we laugh at it for existing everytime we drive by. TVC has mainline service from DL for part of the summer, but apparently there is no functioning market there, because the prices are sky high compared to the highly competitive market at DTW.

The actual known center of the universe, which is about 125 miles from where I am, actually has EWR, JFK, and LGA, all of which have tons of mainline service to anywhere you could ever need to fly.

I do not fit in them. I got stuck on one once because I didn't realize what I was getting, and that was the last time I will ever get on a CRJ or Embraer. I can fly anywhere in the CONUS on Southwest or mainline Delta, and as this thread has discovered, on DL's new 717 mainline fleet if I can't get cheap tickets on flysouthwest.com.

BiggAW

Also, for example, the state of Maine is served out of Manchester, NH with commercial mainline service. Manchester also serves all of NH, much of VT, as well as half of the Boston metro area (split with PVD). Still not sure why WN decided to go into BOS, since it's redundant to MHT and PVD. I hope they thought it out, or maybe it was a merger condition from AirTran that they couldn't consolidate out BOS?

gooselee

If an airline only offered domestic flights to/from JFK, I would stop flying them to NYC. JFK to Manhattan is miserable compared to LGA.

Also, JFK's congestion problems will not be solved by consolidating pax into fewer planes. JFK ranks 19th on the list of busiest airports by airplane movements. Many of the ones with more flights don't see nearly the same amount of congestion and runway/taxi delays as JFK does on a regular basis.

Finally, MDW is not WN's "big hub." Perhaps if your universe is centered around New England and the midwest, it's the most common place you see them, but certainly not the center of their operations.

+1

Remember that many of the airports that get commercial service through EAS are not receiving planes just for the people. In the bellies of those passenger jets are goods, mail, etc. that those communities need. I suppose OP would just as well have some place like Pellston (which I have admittedly never been to) fall off the face of the map because it doesn't matter and its airport is so small.

I still can't figure out how a 6'3" person doesn't "fit" on an RJ. The E190 has an interior height of 6'9". CR9 is 6'3". CRJ is 6'1". For the latter two, yes, you will need to duck a couple inches during boarding, like many of us. But if you're like the rest of us, you're generally at least a couple feet shorter when sitting vs. standing. Uncomfortable, sure. "Don't fit"...that's a bit much.

Still, if flying on a 737 is that important to you and you also apparently have such free time that you can make the 4.5 hour drive from major airports to remote locations, then spend the extra time and money to book a flight on your beloved WN. Or charter a Gulfstream with its 5-foot ceilings.

gooselee

Wow. You should really just stop wasting time on FT and go run an airline. I'm certain that none of the route planners have caught on to the fact that they need to stop serving the large airport in the dead middle of the 10th largest metro area in the country. After all, passengers will be pleased to fly into airports that are an hour away (with no traffic) from where they need to go.

BiggAW

Some only fly to LGA today. Also, it's really hard to get to LGA, which is why I've never flown out of there. From CT, JFK is easy, you just go on the E train to Jamaica and AirTrain from there. For LGA, you either have to take the M60 from 125th or, IIRC, the Q70 from the 7, neither of which looks like a good deal. I guess I should just learn the bus system and suck it up and do the 7/Q70 route.

JFK was never designed for that traffic volume, and there isn't enough room. Reducing the number of flight movements by 30-40% would pretty much eliminate the delays. Comparing JFK to ATL is useless, because ATL is designed to be the largest airport in the world. JFK wasn't designed to be a fraction of that.

I'm BWI centric, but MDW is WN's largest hub, although they are pretty well spread out between BWI, MDW, DEN, and sort of MCO.

FedEX and UPS fly jets to everywhere that need them. They truck to other places. The USPS can truck as well. The only places I know of that can't truck are in Alaska, and they use 737's to deliver everything, and don't have airport congestion either.

It wasn't really on the map in the first place. For the vast majority of normal people, Pellston isn't on the map anyway. They fly out of DTW or maybe TVC, FNT, or GRR. That area of MI is busy in the summer, and I can tell you that almost no one is flying up there. Most are from the southern part of MI, and the few who aren't, like myself, are flying into DTW.

I need 6'4" to even have a shot on the thing.

Even if I fit, the tickets are absurdly expensive to BFE. If I need to go to BFE, then I fly near BFE, and complete my journey beating someone else's car up. I can get almost anywhere in the CONUS with low fares on flysouthwest.com, home of the low fares. The Amtrak Empire Builder serves a good chunk of Montana and North Dakota if I want to go there, or I can roadtrip it.

Another idiotic destination is Peoria, IL. One of my co-workers flew there, even though it makes absolutely no sense, since that area is served out of MDW, with direct service pretty much everywhere.

pkk

yep, let's get rid of all the regional airports so some people will have to drive 4, 5 or 6 hours to a major airport. That sounds sooooooooo much better. Just don't fly on the planes that you don't want to fly on. If not for my regional airports, I wouldn't fly much. I love my local airports.

pkk

Well then why didn't the coworker simply drive the quick 3 hour drive from MDW to PIA. ?? PIA is my favorite local airport and I use it quite often. When I fly to Europe I usually start in PIA and save a TON of money compared to driving to ORD or some other 3 or 4 hour drive.

I prefer my locals that I can drive to in an hour.

BiggAW

In the case of well actually, WN built up huge marketshare and traffic volumes in the Boston metro market by running a lot of traffic through MHT and PVD, and for a long time, they were running the entire metro Boston market through these two. If you look at a map, most of the market is about equidistant by car, sorry CAH, from BOS and either MHT or PVD, except for the immediate urban market in BOS. Both airports are easier to get in and out of than BOS, and have small markets of their own that now have much better air service as a result of WN's decision to split the Boston market in half and move it out of BOS, at least until they ended up back in BOS.

Going into BOS isn't reflective of their roots as a true LCC, although on the flip side, they seem to be doing very well and offering great service as a sort-of LCC that's also become an incumbent in their own right, even though they're not a legacy.

BiggAW

The regional airlines are clogging up the runways. The big planes with the most passengers should have priority, so that more people can get where they want in a more efficient manner.

The very least the government should do if they're not going to clean up the regional mess entirely would be to outlaw regionals flying jets around that are painted for other airlines. If some rinky-dink airline wants to fly around, they can ticket through a legacy operator, but they should have to clearly ID the flight with their name and their logos.

And then the travel sites should offer easy options to only search for mainline flights, which would make finding mainline flights a lot easier. Of course for domestic US travel, it's pretty easy to just skip the travel sites and go directly to flysouthwest.com, so the legacy carriers just miss out on that entirely.

BiggAW

Darn good question. I have no clue why he want to Peoria instead of direct to MDW, which would have made a heck of a lot more sense.

mAAine_flyer

I am literally ROTFLMFAO.

Thanks for the entertaining thread ^

BiggAW

What's so funny? You can get to 46 of the 48 CONUS states with flysouthwest.com, and they are usually (although not always) the cheapest.

mAAine_flyer

You do realize that "someone else's car" quite likely has a lower headroom than the RJs you claim to get stuck on, right?

Your insights into rural/urban social geography and commercial airline service in the USA.

BiggAW

You don't have to walk in and out of a car with luggage, and if you want to get out and stretch, you pull over, get out, and stretch.

WN's success and meteoric rise proved my point exactly. They went where the demand is, focused on the domestic market, focused on a single type of aircraft, didn't get distracted, and did things right. Meanwhile, DL has no identity, it's this big mess that has 11 mainline aircraft, regional partners with another half-dozen or so, and no focus. They're flying long-haul international, mainline domestic, everything down to their regional partners flying ridiculously tiny planes on ridiculously tiny routes. With the exception of part of Montana and North Dakota, WN now serves the entire CONUS with commercial mainline service with 1/17th the number of types of aircraft, and probably 1/2-1/3 the number of airports. WN is a model of efficiency.