evanb

I agree that Europe is probably over traded for the time being and that DL will just focus on the JVs to the big three hubs in Europe.

The more interesting potential will be to see if SEA can compete with DTW and MSP for DL's attention with regards to Asia. Could SEA scoop some secondary Chinese or Japanese cities from DTW or MSP, or will DL just push any marginal capacity direct from US hubs to ICN? A lot will depend on how big DL can build the feed into SEA. While SEA has a higher cost base for DL compared to DTW or MSP, the natural yield advantage and geographic position could supersede cost. While a longshot, SEA could see SEA-MNL or SEA-SIN take over from NRT-MNL and NRT-SIN once the HND switch is complete. If DL suprised us and decided to return to HKG, surely there is a good chance that SEA would be the origin? Again, these are speculative, but probably more likely than any further ventures into Europe.

ab2013

evanb

I'm not so bearish on it. DL currently operate NRT-SIN. Given that it's one of the two last NRT 5th freedom routes it must be good great for DL! As the NRT hub winds down that traffic will go somewhere else. That will either be through the KE JV or with a non-stop from the US. I'm not yet convinced that it'll go through the KE JV since they could have already done that. That leads me to believe that they might look to start a US-SIN flight, the question is whether SEA beats out MSP or DTW for it. Given the GC distance of a MSP/DTW-MSP flight, it's not inconceivable that SEA-SIN on DL wins out.

On the other hand, when take US distribution into account SQ's feed on the SEA end is significantly inferior to DL, even DL's relatively dismal SEA feed. It's speculative, but not inconceivable.

third_wave

I wasn't aware that the AF product was considered superior to the DL product. Why would they care about being on AF vs. DL?

hi55us

Great point. Between Delta and Alaska for a random Monday in August (8/12) they are flying SEA-PDX 30 times a day, that's just nuts. For a 1 hour flight, a 3 1/2 hour high speed train would beat flying and bring you right into Downtown Seattle/Portland (a process that takes ~1 hour on either end right now, depending on Security at SEA). I'd be curious how much of that feed is O&D and could be delegated to more efficient transportation methods.

It would be in Delta's best interest to have zero PDX-SEA flights, since those gates could be used on higher yielding TATL/TPAC routes, vs. the $70 OW fares I'm seeing right now for SEA-PDX.

evanb

Well, they wouldn't have zero. They'd still want a few, well timed, connecting into banks in SEA. Not dissimilar to AMS-BRU, where the train has taken most of the traffic but KL still operate about 5 daily for connections. They also price non-connecting tickets to discourage people using the flight for O&D rather than connections.

bpe

A proper high-speed train could do it in just over an hour - the current low-speed train is about 3 1/2 hours

I don't know about Delta's flights, but at least Alaska is using Q400s for most or all of the flights - they take up less gate space, faster turnaround times, and are more efficient, while their speed isn't a huge disadvantage on the short flights.

The Situation

Great in theory, but this has zero percent chance of happening in my lifetime (and I have a lot of life ahead of me). Existing railroad lines are too crowded with freight traffic and its not like we are going to be shipping less goods. Traffic is the primary reason the train takes 3.5 hours as someone else mentioned, not the speed of the train, the technology, or the number of stops. Cost is not going to be the issue since people out here have never met a tax increase they didn't approve, but the location. To have truly high speed rail to compete with air traffic, new right of ways would need to be established for new rail lines. New railways would be established by bulldozing peoples' houses and creating a lot of "eyesores" and "nuisances" including noise and vibrations. Its not like people are going to want a tunnel going under their house either. Pile on the environmental considerations of disturbing the soil and removing trees (especially as the rail line passes through rural areas) and given how much opposition there is to overlaying desperately needed new infrastructure over existing infrastructure here...high speed rail will not happen.

BenA

Don't forget the sorry state of our rail infrastructure, particularly with regards to safety. A recent WSJ article quoted Richard Anderson as saying he recruited a former safety officer from Delta, Ken Hylander, by texting him pictures from the scene of the recent derailment of the Amtrak Cascades route that happened on opening day of the new Point Defiance bypass, which was supposed to be the first use of new track that shaved some time off the Seattle-Portland route. That segment is _still_ not in use, and after a ridiculously damning set of findings from the NTSB may not be for years - possibly until an entirely new set of train cars is ordered.

That route will eventually get fixed, but it's going to consume the next 5-10 years of mindshare (especially because WSDOT/Amtrak may need to retire the existing fleet of train cars.) With that in mind, there's no way we'll see anything faster until that is resolved.

If we can't even open a 15 mile bypass, there is no way we're building entirely new right of way across the most inhabited corridor of the state in less than several decades, unless something fundamental changes about our willingness to invest in infrastructure.

jdrtravel

I'm not so sure. CA had been set to build high speed rail from SF to LA, something that would be hugely beneficial to the state, and certainly relieve a tremendous amount of airport traffic (I think it is one of the busiest routes in the world, with several million pax per year). Now it's been trimmed back to a train from nowhere to nowhere because of cost.

jrl767

jdrtravel

Federal issue aside, the state still did not allocate enough money (even with full federal funding) to complete the project from downtown to downtown. The federal politics came in later.

evanb

What's going to be quicker, more efficient and cheaper?
1) Additional investment at SEA to significantly increase gate & ramp space?
2) Increase capacity at other Seattle area airports?
3) Additional rail capacity?

First two options are much, much easier, quicker and significantly cheaper. In the long run (say 30 plus years) will it be more efficient? Probably not. I guess that's why we're seeing relative small improvements like adding 8 gates to north satellite and other airlines ramping up capacity at Paine Field.

ab2013

They'd rather bleed money on SEA-PDX to feed existing international (and the other domestic) flights. They'd bleed more heavily on long-distance TATL/TPAC routes relying on O/D traffic (much higher in ASMs), and that would reflect in their earnings reports, which have been consistently pretty good (usually exceeding Wall St expectations). That's why they've been increasing number of seats on regionals like SEA-PDX/GEG/BOI/PSC/MFR/EUG and cutting SEA-HKG, which reportedly lost $20 million a year.

There's not much evidence that TPAC is high-yielding. During the low season, DL does sell last minute one-way tickets for $300 on routes like SEA-PEK/PVG. DL is also selling round-trip tickets to LON from SEA in coach in November for ~$600

BA

Quite the opposite. SQ's feed at SEA is through AS which has far more flights and destinations than DL does from SEA.