Mountain Explorer

Any attempt to replace a narrowbody with a widebody or vice versa while maintaining the same cabins and seat count is obviously not gonna work.

ChamplinAl

.......Thinking seat-wise, the replacement A321XLR's makes since (220 B76E seats to 210 A32X seats). Now lets look at the range of each aircraft. B767-300ER's range is beyond 6300 statute miles. A321XLR's have a range of 5100 statute miles. 76E's are twin isle, 321's are single isle. To fly up to 10+ hours in a single isle frame might not be a good choice for some passengers. Delta, currently, has no order with Airbus for these frames. To my way of thinking: Delta would be farther ahead finding used A332's with the PW (Pratt & Whitney) engines (that DL received with the NWA merger) to add to their current 11 frames. The A332's have roughly 230 seats and with a range of over 8000 statute miles and would fit into Delta's stable just fine. I believe that the A330-800neo is just a more current and more efficient version of the A330-200's. I also remember that the only customer for the A338's was Hawaiian Airlines - which cancelled their order and then ordered Boeing B787-8's. I'm not sure if Airbus allows any future orders on the A338's anyway. The following city pairs would be just beyond the reach of the A32X, and is well into the A332 range: LAX-AMS, LAX-CDG, JFK-TLV, DTW-NGO (serviced by 332 pre covid), JFK-BOM (permanently suspended - covid). My guess is that DL would not need a 1 for 1 replacement of the approximately 30-32 surviving B767-300ER's, probably 15-16 in addition to their current 11.

CMK10

While I won't miss flying on the CRJ-200 I'm certainly going to miss the airports Delta serves with them. I can't picture them keeping service to ABY, CSG and VLD, all regulars of mine, with anything larger and I worry about AEX and MLU and similar places too. Plus it means it's unlikely they'll keep some of the RDU segments, especially BWI, they serve too.

cfabar1

It is the tradeoff... Hopefully we see some of the CRJ routes continue. It is fascinating to me how in 20 years we went from entire major hubs being built around the CRJ (CVG, MCO, to some extent SLC), and now these planes are totally eliminated from Delta altogether.

tardyturtle

I wonder what the incremental cost to operate a CRJ7 vs. CRJ2 to these routes is and how easy it would be to substitute for these routes?

AANYC1981

Its at least an additional FA position

cmd320

What about the -550s like UA is getting?

ATOBTTR

A few of us on here have also said similar things - while the CRJ-200 is certainly "Satan's Chariot," if the choice is between a CRJ-200 and no service, my guess is most people would opt for the CRJ-200, and many airports that see CRJ-200 service were served with even (to many at least) less preferable options before the CRJ-200 entered service (such as the EMB-120). So I too will be curious to see what happens at many of these smaller outstations in the Upper Midwest, Great Plains, and Southeastern US that only see CRJ-200s -- will these airports lose service altogether, or will they receive EAS contracts which could see such routes then operated by a regional carrier with CRJs it picks up and flies under its own metal to some form of a small prop.

cmd320

I’d take the EM2 over the CRJ for most short operations. Anything longer I’d take neither.

CMK10

It's nice that you have the option of neither but some of us don't. If I have to be in Alexandria or Monroe or Valdosta and the option is flying a CRJ-200 or not going at all I can't well say to my client "sorry, only Satan's Chariot serves your airport so I can't go, if you were a Flyertalker you'd understand".

cmd320

I don’t disagree that it’s nice, I certainly don’t frequent many small destinations where I ordinarily have this problem, but every now and then it happens, most often TRI.

I’m usually willing to drive an additional hour or two from a larger airport if it means not folding myself up into a piece of origami to fit into a CRJ and in this case I’ll use CLT or GSO over TRI. There’s also the added benefit of it not being ridiculously expensive (is TRI the most expensive airport in the US or something?).

allseas1586

The real problem is there aren't too many CR7's left. Endeavor has something like 18 and I think SkyWest will be down to 3 primarily for Aspen ops.

Since the CRJ-production line is shut down now who knows what the future will hold or what the ability would be to pick up some used regional aircraft with green time.

SJC ORD LDR

Are ERJs still being produced? I'm curious what will happen in terms of smaller regional jets going forward. There is still a market for these jets and I prefer them to turboprops. I've had way too many miserable ASA EMB120 rides for a lifetime.

jb1012xna

Just to touch on both points from an anecdotal observation of a previous CR2 airport that was completely cut earlier this year...
DL tried upgrading ATL-FSM several times over the last 4-5 years to CR7s when they were a bigger percentage of the RJ fleet and they never lasted. That was with only 2 flights total per day. (I believe some days they tried 1x CR7 and 1x CR2). Seemed they only stuck for 2-3 months at a time at most and then fell back down to CR2s.
On one hand XNA is only ~70 minutes north, though the bad news is that we have much higher fares. TUL is better for fares but it's closer to two hours away.

cmd320

ERJs are still available to the market. They were always far superior to CRJs IMO. I have no problem flying on an ERJ for a short flight, won’t set foot on a CRJ anymore.