ab2013

This is just a theory but they cut BOS to spoke (lots of overlap, might stay that way after COVID-19 is over) and probably want to preserve a presence in the NE US. (Same theory for SEA, though IIRC based on the terms of the federal aid package, they have to maintain the domestic stations they're present in, which includes FAI/ANC)

AviationFreak

Looks like the TATL cuts are extended into May. I have a current booking (that I likely wasn't going to fly anyways) and the flights are no longer bookable. Only DL option seems to be 1x daily ATL-CDG

david22

I wonder when they'll officially cancel them?

navi_jen

I am not surprised they cut the BOS shuttles, it's basically a commuter plane. And with most businesses WFH and cities on virtual lockdown, not surprised they've drastically cut the schedule. At this point, I'd rather drive the 3.5 hours into Manhattan than getting on a plane.

Normally, these flights are fairly full (to both NYM destinations), right up to the last flight departing NYM @10pm. I suspect ops will ramp this back up quickly, particularly considering both NY and MA are at the leading edge of the US pandemic.

cfabar1

I was planning on going to England this Summer and slightly before Coronavirus decided not to. I'm very glad. Not sure I'd have had a way to get there and back.

I wonder when we will start seeing the big cuts to May and June. No way there is any sort of ramping up of air travel until late June, early July. Will there even be all the carriers then? Glad I am on the strongest one, but I could see some of the smaller operators going on a hiatus never to return...

ab2013

Well the BOS routes are not doing very well based not the data that has gotten posted on airliners.net - they're not profitable (might be full but the yields are not good), and there are folks out there that expect a slow rebound in demand for air travel. We might see some shifts in attitude towards virtual conferencing options, which could have lasting impacts on air travel (and hotels). The US majors have already indicated that they'll emerge from this as smaller carriers and the deep cuts to BOS this month suggest that it might lose its hub status and have a smaller footprint in DL's network in the post-corona world. Also, in this post-corona world, DL won't be in the same strong financial position to fund as many money-losing experiments.

GrayAnderson

I mean, driving into NYC (or driving to somewhere along the New Haven Line and grabbing a train for the last segment) seems like an entirely feasible thing to do at this stage. The roads are empty and gas is cheap.

As to DL's future in BOS, who knows? I could see them de-hubbing it (though dropping to "focus city" status seems more likely), though "going in for the kill" on AA and B6 also seems quite plausible given that AA was reeling as of a few months ago.

If I had to guess, the net effect of this whole situation is going to be:
(1) A number of smaller airports wind up getting frequency cuts or cut to "tag flight" status (a la Alaska). I don't think we'll see a return to "full" milk runs, but depending on crew rotations and so forth the idea of running some flights between hubs with two stops in between doesn't seem utterly outlandish (particularly if the airports in question were already getting CRJs and the like).
(2) A general decrease in frequency and partial consolidation within some metro areas between airports (e.g. I could see PHF simply getting shut down in favor of ORF/RIC; I think PAE might be a casualty of this as well).

Beyond that, it'll depend on just how bad the long(er)-term hit is (i.e. over the next 2-3 years). A hit of 10% simply means a bunch of airports end up with smaller planes or wind up with a frequency cut here and there. A hit of 20-30% starts verging on requiring a fundamental restructuring of the system since that'll also force prices up to cover a flight that might've just gone from a load factor of 85% to 65% (if downgauging isn't an option). And all of this does hint at major losses in terms of some aircraft getting parked for a long time.

FWIW, regardless of the above my guess is that the main casualty will be "long and thin" routes (which had been proliferating for some time) and there will be a number of city pairs that go back to requiring double connections.

navi_jen

And, we can take the Merritt and Hutchinson Parkways, both beautiful and fun. I admit, I've gone "Cannonball Run" more than once on those roads. _

I would be very sad if DL scales back operations at BOS. Jet Blue just doesn't have the scale/route network. Guess it's all wait and see at this point.

rylan

Agreed would also be sad if BOS takes a significant long term hit, especially since DL recently added a lot of service there.

Sure you can drive, but will still have to pay 75/day to park in NYC and deal with traffic. Even with less people at work traffic will still be horrible there, and along the 95 corridor. Yes the Meritt and Hutch are good alternates but those can get plenty of traffic in certain areas too. Good comment about the Cannonball Run there... I miss doing that on the way to/back from college for semester breaks years ago.

ab2013

SEA-HND frequency getting cut to 3x/wk

https://news.delta.com/where-delta-f...-april-updated

firehawk

Was looking at prices a couple of days ago from seattle to vegas and was getting like 220 bucks one way on first. 3 weeks ago was like 100 bucks flying out on the same week (not for this week but.. for 3 weeks ago)

Also noticed now they switched aircrafts so only 3 first class rows instead of 5 or 6.

Any ideas what's going on given they did reduce the ticket prices and less flying demand? Not sure how a smaller aircraft will help social distancing but I get trying to be more profitable during these times.

Even if checking to fly next week... same situation.
Any ideas?

GrayAnderson

So, a couple of things:
(1) Loads are in the floor. Like, off by 90% or more on a bunch of routes. It took DL a few weeks to sort out how to rework fleet use, but most flights have been downgauged and frequencies slashed. As an example, JFK-LAX/SFO is mostly running 757s. Monday's JFK-SFO (single) nonstop flight only shows about 16 seats taken (discounting the universal blocking of middle seats); quite literally, if nobody else books this might turn into a "put everyone in First" flight. The JFK-LAX flight seems to show somewhere in the 30s in terms of seats taken, but whereas on the SFO flight it looks like they blocked out the last two rows, the LAX flight has a bunch of seats blocked that might be a management blocking or just a bunch of seats sold there. The bottom line is that it is entirely possible that on some routes, smaller planes might still enable sufficient distancing.

Also, IIRC there are several layouts of some planes within the same family (the 73X family, for example), so it might not actually be a significantly smaller plane (i.e. a 737-700 vs a 737-900), and it might be an artifact of DL sorting out which planes it is keeping in the air vs parking (and frantically rebuilding flight schedules in the meantime).

(2) I think we'll be debating what happened a few weeks ago for a long time, but there are two theories that both hold water in my mind. One is that Delta let fares fall dramatically in order to get people home. They've hard-capped evacuation fares before, so that might have been the impetus behind some of what we saw. The other theory is that the computers basically had a nervous breakdown when loads collapsed. The main question is whether some of the absurdly low fares that popped up (I was seeing RIC-MCO down in the $40s!) were previously in the system or not. Those fares are not presently in the system, so it seems possible that this was a management decision to slash the heck out of fares when people were scrambling back from trips either as a competitive move or as a goodwill gesture. In particular, they might have been loaded in before most airlines gave in on allowing change/cancel on all tickets (if you're hosed by a ULCC and Delta gets you home for $50 or B6 gets you home for $20, that's gonna build a lot of goodwill).

Basically, anything from the last month should be regarded as an unusual situation.

firehawk

Very interesting response! Thank you

MCO Flyer

I believe the fares are mostly built by computer algorithms. The super cheap fare started to disappear when DL began to slash the schedules down by 80% which.

koreanair720

Anybody know when the May schedule is expected to roll out? Have an int'l flight I'd like to cancel for a cash refund -- I'm almost certain it will be cancelled, but it hasn't been yet.